Shadow Walker
by lorien829
Summary: What happened to the Other Hermione that Harry encountered in "Shadow Walks"? As she struggles to survive, despite immense loss, in a world that no longer has a place for her, how will the reappearance of someone she'd thought she'd never see again change her life completely? Reading "Shadow Walks" first is advised. Companion piece; alternate universe.
1. Chapter 1

**Brief Notes:**

This is the start of a companion piece to my story, "Shadow Walks". While possibly not totally necessary, it would probably be advisable to read that story first. This is not a sequel, per se, as events in this story do not progress out of events in the other story, but it moves in a tangent - or maybe a parallel - involving the Other Hermione whom our Harry encountered in his travels through the multiverse. "Shadow Walks" moved more or less from canon prior to book 7. "Shadow Walker" takes place in one of the alternate universes depicted in the first story. The AU alters from general canon with Dumbledore's murder by Draco in the Trio's sixth year and the subsequent delay of the Horcrux Hunt. I refer you to chapters 16-19 in "Shadow Walks" as a refresher, if needed.

I had originally contemplated a short two- or three-shot about Other Hermione's search, but decided that she deserved a story too. The story begins at the Final Battle, which occurs three years later than it did in "Shadow Walks"…

Enjoy.

 **Shadow Walker**

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **\- Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

 _ **Chapter One:**_

 _ **Now that I know what I'm without, you can't just leave me.**_

 _ **-Evanescence, "Bring Me to Life"**_

"Hermione," His voice was reedy and desperate, vibrating the escaped ringlets around her ear, causing them to swish around her neck like a lover's caress. She turned to look at him, and all the truths that they had never said seemed to be singing from his brilliant eyes.

Someone behind him shouted. The frightened, yet determined crush of people surged forward.

"Hermione," he said again, and it was almost a groan. Trapped in the Army of the Light, his hand found hers, fingers tangled briefly together. He had moved closer; she could feel the heat of him. His lips touched the shell of her ear only slightly - they were best friends, whispering together before battle.

He breathed her name again, one more time, and it was a sigh and a promise. "When this is over, you - we - I want …"

"I know, Harry," she said, stopping to search his eyes with hers, to let him see how she felt, to let herself mirror all the emotions that she now saw swimming in his gaze.

His fingers touched hers again, slid up her arm, leaving trails of fire in their wake. Her breathing quickened, became erratic. His breath was warm on her jaw, on the point of her chin. His eyes burned into hers.

Almost imperceptibly, he leaned forward. Hermione felt her lashes flutter, as her eyes began to close.

He was going to kiss her.

It was the culmination of years of secret longings that she had not admitted she even had - not even to herself. It was going to happen here, in the unlikeliest of places, the most unromantic of company, squashed just outside the Great Hall, with the Order of the Phoenix and all who stood with them, ready to face what ultimately awaited them.

Hermione had been content with the idea of death, at least in the abstract. She had prepared for this day as best she could, had helped prepare Harry as best she could, and she had found herself almost calm. What did it matter, really, if she perished in battle, as long as the sought objectives were attained? What was most important was ensuring Voldemort's utter demise. But now, as this whole new vista opened before her, a path that she had thought closed - or non-existent - she found herself railing a little at the timing. Why must they go save the world _now_? But she knew she wouldn't expect anything less of him - or of herself.

Her head tilted back ever so slightly. They were not quite touching, but she could feel his radiant heat, spreading outward from where his hand rested on her elbow. His breath had moved upward, and now fanned her face.

The clamor grew deafening. Wands were raised; there were shouts of challenge, claiming triumph, covering fear. Someone was speaking. Hermione thought it might have been Remus Lupin, but she wasn't sure. The voice seemed distant and garbled, as if played at too slow a speed or heard from too far away.

"Promise me…" he said, whispering almost into her mouth, his lips barely skimming hers, still treading that fine line - two friends whispering, just two friends whispering together. She wondered if he were being mindful of the Weasleys sprinkled through the crowd.

"Of course, Harry," she finished, though he did not. He didn't need to. She'd give him anything, sacrifice anything, go anywhere… in spite of - or perhaps _because_ of - the fact that he'd never ask it of her. She had loved him for _so long_.

His hand slid back down to hers, two jaunty short squeezes, and a feather-light kiss on the cheek - _just two friends, just two friends_ \- and the great double doors of Hogwarts began to swing open ponderously.

She saw Harry's chin lift, the dying light from the west now breaking through to glint off of his glasses. She searched for Ron in the crowd, spied his ginger head, gilded fiery copper. He tapped his wand to his temple in silent salute. She nodded back, just one quick downward tug of her chin. They had all said good-bye in the Gryffindor common room earlier.

"One quick murder and this'll all be over, yeah?" Harry quipped at her, twisting his mouth up hopefully, begging for her to find a modicum of humor in what he said. Her instinct was to reprimand him school-marmishly. _Harry, don't even joke about such things._ Instead she replied,

"We should all be back in time for supper."

The appreciation that lit his eyes did her heart good.

And then Remus and Ron were there, moving into pre-planned formation, and the mass of humanity was moving forward.

And there was no time to say anything else.

* * *

The Order of the Phoenix had done their best to prepare for the onslaught. The secret passage to Honeyduke's cellar had been well worn by fighters, planning to approach the castle from Hogsmeade and outflank the Death Eaters. Order members were crouching in almost every available window and turret, trying not to gape at the sheer number of giants, werewolves, trolls, and menacing figures in hoods and cloaks that were arrayed across the Hogwarts green.

Hermione, Harry, and Ron were stationed with the frontal assault, their chief objective to find Voldemort and dispatch him - or allow Harry to dispatch him - as quickly as possible. They were gambling on the premise that there were orders not to harm Harry, that Voldemort wanted the pleasure of murdering Harry personally.

A quiet tide of despair began welling up in Hermione as the two groups of people surged to meet each other. They'd gone through so much in the last three years since they'd finished school: translating and deciphering the meaning behind the cryptic notes Dumbledore had left for them after he'd been so shockingly murdered, poisoned by a bottle of mead, of all things; gradually unearthing the horrific truth of horcruxes, and the lengths to which Voldemort had gone to avoid death - this had involved a rather unpleasant trip to Azkaban prison and an intense session involving former Professor Slughorn, who was being held for the Headmaster's murder, and had been force-fed Veritaserum. It had taken three years, years of frustration and desperation and pain and heartache and death. They had lost many: Percy, Bill, Moody, Professor McGonagall. Somehow the three of them had survived, though Hermione occasionally wondered if her character had been so irrevocably compromised that, even when the war concluded, she'd never be able to reclaim herself.

But a light had dawned at the end of the tunnel. Here it was, facing them at last: the Minotaur, finally looming before them, after they had stumbled, half-blind, cringing and fearful, through the maze for years. There would be no side-stepping, no fleeing, no denying, no retreating - nothing to do now, but fight. Hermione was all too familiar with the dread of a thing being actually worse than the thing itself.

And Harry had touched her, barely kissed her - a promise, a vow of what was to come. Could he possibly, truly love her? Were they really to have a chance? Her heart seized at the tiny tendril of hope, curled it protectively inside herself, tucked it away for safekeeping.

The clash of the fight drove out the remembrance of his whispered words in her ear. The cool twilight wind, bringing with it, not refreshment, but the stench of blood and burned flesh and death, blew away the sensation of his breath caressing her face. The sight of Seamus, with his torso torn open, falling into a puddle of his own blood, blotted out the memory of the desire that had glowed in Harry's eyes.

She hurled herself to the ground as a curse sang over her head. The grass prickled her cheek, dirt slid and caked beneath her fingernails, and her blood thrummed in accelerated response to the staccato race of her heart.

There was no more time to dwell on Harry, to even look sideways at him.

She threw herself into the business of bringing the curtain down on the accursed War.

Her ears rang as she fought, picking her way through the melee, her arm movements emphatic and precise, her wand a slender and slashing brown blur. She could feel the heat of her blood in her face, the surging, thrilling swell of adrenaline, and every now and then an inarticulate cry of rage or effort would reach her ears, and she would realize in astonishment that she was its source. An uncounted number of masked wizards and witches fell before her, and she could not have told anyone afterwards what exactly happened.

And then the entire scenario seemed to come to an abrupt halt. She could have sworn she actually heard the screech of a phonograph needle across vinyl. A frantic toss of her head allowed her a glimpse of Harry and Ron, not unscathed but still standing, just to her left. Harry exchanged an unreadable glance with Ron, and began to move in front of her, pushing her hand down gently, where it had begun to lift, to aim and wield the wand she clenched so tightly that she had left miniature furrows in the slim handle.

Her lips parted, but the protest died in her throat, as she and Ron began to slide toward each other, as if choreographed to do so. Harry did not look back at them, but his spine was straight, his shoulders square, his head lifted. It was clear that he was not afraid, and that irrefutable fact made Hermione even more ashamed of the fear that made her tremble all over.

Voldemort was waiting, and it was as if time had literally stopped. A fell hush draped across the battlefield like heavy, smothering velvet, as everyone waited, knowing too well that this would be the penultimate act, that the end was imminent. A sweeping arc of the Dark Wizard's wand formed a great domed shield, translucent, but preventing anyone from affecting the outcome. A random Death Eater could have easily taken a pot shot at Harry, as he'd moved, totally focused, toward his nemesis, but of course, Voldemort's ego would not have permitted it.

Sweat trickled from Hermione's hairline into her eyes, burning and commingling with the tears. The dome shimmered and swam gelatinously in her vision. She felt Ron's grimy fingers entwine with hers.

And the duel was engaged.

The two men circled each other like wary panthers, each unsure of the proper opening gambit, each searching for something to exploit. Harry's eyes were blazing with a righteous fury that was discernible even through Voldemort's shield. His teeth were gritted, his chest heaved; Hermione could feel herself breathing in tandem with him. For a moment, she let herself recall once again the feather-light whisper of his lips against hers, and when the first curse sang out, it startled her badly.

The spells came with rapid fury, streaking, multi-colored beams of light that either ricocheted erratically - and terrifyingly - off of the dome, or melded into it with a series of crackling pops and hisses. Other than those noises, there was an eerie, near-total silence, as all of the casting was done non-verbally. Hermione was rather astonished at how good Harry had become.

The battle seemed to stretch on for hours. What Harry lacked in experience or in Darkness, he made up for with youth and unconventional thinking. Still, Hermione could tell he was tiring, as his wand arm began to sag, trembling from the strain, and leaving his right side dangerously open to attack. His hair was wringing wet, and there were sweat stains on his clothes. He seemed to be having trouble keeping his glasses in place in front of his eyes, and he reached up an unsteady left hand to adjust them.

Voldemort made his move.

"Harry!" Hermione shrieked involuntarily, although she had no way of knowing whether or not outside sound could even penetrate the dome. Her fingers bit into Ron's.

But then she saw Harry's head snap up, saw the trajectory of his gaze, his wand, saw the trembling cease, and she knew that he was more than aware of what was going on around him.

The fatigue had been an act.

Green light boiled from the tip of Voldemort's wand, aimed like a true arrow toward Harry's chest. The Boy Who Lived stood, feet planted widely, making no attempt to dodge or block or counter-attack.

Hermione knew what they had practiced, knew what Harry held as his trump card, and her heart was still in her throat. Ron's face was as pale as old milk.

At the last possible second, Harry screamed a single word in Latin.

" _Inflecto!_ "

Hermione was holding her breath, without realizing it. The green glow hit the end of Harry's wand for the briefest of moments, and began moving in the opposite direction even faster, as if it had bounced itself off of the wand the way a competitive swimmer turns at the end of a lane. She distantly registered the murmur of voices rising to crescendo like ocean swells.

Voldemort's wand was a blur, red panic in his eyes, and even as his thin lips formed words, the _Avada_ struck the one who'd birthed it, turning, at the last, on its master. His body arced through the air, the parabola ending at the base of the dome, which flickered and shrank into nothingness.

Harry took a cautious step forward, quietly Summoning the Dark Wizard's wand. The silence lay thickly on Hermione's ears like pads of cotton, only to be broken by the crisp snap of Voldemort's wand in Harry's fingers.

Voldemort's gasping inhalation gave fresh fuel to the murmurs. Hermione made an involuntary move toward Harry, as if in warning, but Ron forced her to stay back. The Dark Lord was prone, wandless, his chest sunken in and black from the impact of the rebounded spell. He had obviously been hastily performing some spell to counter the _Avada Kedavra_ , but, while it had kept him from dying immediately, it hadn't been enough, hadn't come in time.

The sullen red light began to fade from his fell eyes; his breaths were effortful and slowing. One by one, muted cries of agony rose up from the field of battle in discordant and despairing chorus, as the Dark Marks began to respond to the fall of their Master. Death Eaters began to wobble and collapse, as what remained of the Order tried to confiscate as many wands as they could.

Ron let go of Hermione's hand, as her eyes slid shut, and she felt the massive cinder-block weight of anxiety lift itself from her chest. Harry swiveled on one heel, turned to look at her, and the brilliant certainty that he had not forgotten their hasty touches in the Great Hall - that, in fact, he had not stopped thinking about it - made her take a half-step back to keep from falling.

She did not know when she had started crying, but she was almost laughing at the same time, a high, shaky, euphoric sound born of fatigue and relief. She knew they had losses, grievous ones, but she could not make herself process anything beyond the fact that he was alive and they had _won_.

A faint movement teased at the periphery of her vision, and she looked back at their fallen nemesis. One skeletally curved hand still moved, inching its way across to its mate on the other side. It scrabbled blindly for a moment, and Hermione began to think that it was merely a last instinctual movement, with no rational forethought present, when the fingers locked on to a heavy signet ring and gave it a deliberate twist. Barely perceptibly, the lips, though drawing back in the rictus of death, began to move.

Dread initiated an accelerating drumbeat in Hermione's temples, and before her lips had even parted, Harry had gone down, as if clothes-lined.

" _Harry!_ " Her unearthly wail all but shredded the lining from her throat. She felt, rather than saw, Ron whirl at her cry, but she noticed with horrible clarity the two duelists, separated by less than two meters, breathing horribly slowly, in time with each other.

She flung herself toward him, her vision telescoping until she saw just him, only him, noting the dirt stains on the knees of his jeans, the laceration on his arm, the trailing lace of his trainer that had come untied.

"Harry. Oh dear God, Harry. _Somebody!_ " She was reaching for her wand, casting everything she could think of, as fast as she could articulate it, barely feeling the scalding tears wetting her cheeks.

The futility hit her like a Bludger. She could not counter what she did not know. Her questing hands moved over his shoulders, his face, straightening his glasses, tangling in his hair, enfolding his hands in their grip. His skin was clammy.

"Harry, please Harry, stay with me. Stay with me. _You promised_."

Ron was on his knees beside her.

"What happened?" He seemed as shocked as she. There was movement above and around and behind her. She recognized the voice of Madam Pomfrey.

"I don't know. That ring - he said something, I don't know…" Her voice was watery and incoherent. She held more tightly onto Harry's hand, as if she could will life through her fingertips into his. She pressed her lips to his hands, thought she felt a faint flicker of movement, but when she glanced sharply at his face, his eyes were distant, glassy, unresponsive.

There were clawed hands tearing at her chest. Her face was sticky, her nose was running, and yet she watched his face avidly. _Be the Boy Who Lived, please Harry_.

Another breath drawn in, shallower and slower, noisy but ineffective. His lips took on a bluish cast. Madam Pomfrey was administering potions and casting spells like someone possessed, but Hermione could dimly hear the resignation in her voice.

The cries from the Death Eaters rose up in even louder cacophony, and Hermione realized that Voldemort had finally ceased to be. At almost exactly the same time - barely a breath later - she felt Harry's fingers go limp in hers.

"No," she breathed, barely audibly. Then louder, "No! _NO!_ "

Madam Pomfrey made a flourish with her wand, and began marking time of death. Hermione felt herself slowly falling apart; she was curling up, like a Morning Glory at twilight, her hair washing across his chest.

The tears began to flow as if a dam had burst, completely obscuring her vision, as she wiped her face with his sleeve. Great gulping, heaving, hysterical sobs were coming from somewhere, and she was vaguely surprised to feel them rattling from her own chest, which felt as achingly empty as if her heart had been physically removed - nay, destroyed.

She could still feel the brush of his lips on her cheek, her ear, her mouth, could still feel the funny jump in her stomach when their hands touched. Now, their hands touched again, but Harry's did not feel, and never would again. Her eyes roved over Harry's face; the blue-gray tinge changed him so much that it hurt. She tried to remember what he looked like, when his dark hair and green eyes added vivid strokes of color to his general pallor, the somber gaze, the flash-quick smile… She gently caressed his hair back from his forehead. The grief was an unbearable load that threatened to grow exponentially, to crush her beneath its insensate weight.

 _I'll never see him smile at me again, I'll never meet his gaze and know he's thinking exactly what I'm thinking, I'll never have a conversation with him in the middle of the night after everyone else is sleeping._ Never had always been a tragic word, she thought, but now it was a weapon, and she slashed mercilessly at herself with it, wanted to choke on it. _It's too much, too much… please…_

The finality, the enormity of the loss was paralyzing; she was trying desperately to process it, but there was a fist in her gut, clenched fingers around her throat; she couldn't breathe, she couldn't think; she could only touch him, and weep for what was gone.

Gentle hands encircled her upper arms, and she fought their attempt to draw her away.

"Stop it. _Stop it._ Leave me alone. I can't go; I can't leave him. I promised."

"Hermione… love… he's - he's gone." There were tears in Ron's voice too, and she looked beseechingly up into his face, mourning, with red-rimmed eyes.

"You don't understand. We _promised_."

"I _do_ understand," he replied. She had never seen him look so old and weary. Her eyes were beseeching him, as if begging him to tell her that it wasn't true, that this hadn't happened.

"Let me stay here, with him, please." He touched her again, tentatively, and she jerked away.

"Hermione, you've got to come on!" Ron's voice was harder now, and it made her angry. When she felt him grip her arms again, with more force, and lift her to her feet, she felt murderous.

"Leave me _alone_." She bit out the words with furious finality. He ignored her. When she planted her feet, he merely dragged her, leaving several meters of parallel grooves dug into the dirt by her heels.

She started screaming then, not caring who heard, pleading for Harry, stretching her arms out toward him, and calling Ron every foul epithet she could think of.

"Hermione!" Ron's voice was broken, imploring. His eyes and cheeks were as wet and red as hers. "Hermione, you can't do this here, not now, not like this." Her chin trembled mutinously, but she was listening.

"They're going to have to move his - his - him, Hermione." Ron was speaking carefully, so carefully, as if his words were projectiles that might injure her.

"What's the hurry?" She asked tiredly.

"It's not safe. For Merlin's sake, look around you, Hermione." He was standing sentry-like at her back, wand still out, and Hermione felt her insides leap and clench with returned fear.

She looked, slowly, unwillingly, gulping back a sob, and following Ron's terse instruction.

Twilight had long since fallen, and the gray haze of lingering smoke made it seem even darker. Bright white sparks of multiple _Lumos_ spells darted hither and yon around the battlefield. Even in their variable light, Hermione recognized many of the fallen.

"Oh God…" she breathed. There was Parvati Patil, kneeling, weeping over the prone form of her twin. Seamus, she already knew, was gone, and it seemed that Dean had been killed as well. Two Ravenclaws were tumbled close together, face down, so that she could only identify them by house colors. Shiny, blonde hair could have been Luna or Lavender, but the bright and immaculate manicure told the tale. There were two or three fallen that could have had red hair, but the uncertain light made it difficult to tell. It seemed that those in the white-banded robes of the Order far, far outnumbered black-cloaked Death Eaters among the fallen. Those of the Order still standing each clutched five or six confiscated wands in their hands.

Ron let her look until he knew she had understood, then leaned down, speaking into her ear in a low voice.

"I don't know how long the Dark Mark will keep affecting them. Or when they'll realize that they still have us outnumbered. Or when their allies will realize it and come back out of the Forbidden Forest and finish us off." Hermione noted with a start that he was right, and not one non-human remained on the green. "Do you understand what I'm saying?"

She met his eyes, and his gaze was black in the darkness. Her lips quivered, and she clamped them together, and nodded.

She understood. He was saying that they still weren't safe, that their losses were monumental, that even though they'd won - _He'd won_ \- that it might not be over. It seemed utterly unfair.

"Madam Pomfrey! _Madam Pomfrey!_ " cried a familiar voice. "Please… Charlie - he's - it looks bad - I tried to - _Ron!_ " There was a shriek and a flying figure, ginger hair streaming out like a scarlet pennant in the wind, hurtled itself into his arms.

"Ginny!' He gasped, hugging her tightly, and then moving away so that he could look into her face.

"Have you seen the others? Mum? Dad?"

Ginny shook her head, and her face twisted as she attempted to force her mouth to make normal words. "I found… Daddy…" The little-girl way she referred to her father pierced Hermione like a rapier blade. "And Charlie… I think he's - " Her throat closed up around the word _dying_.

Ron's head sagged down between his shoulders, and Hermione stroked her hand absently down his arm, her gaze returning to Harry. The youngest Weasley followed her line of sight.

"So it is true," was all Ginny said, in a dull, dead voice, and that seemed to have drained her completely. The word had evidently begun to filter around, but there was still much to do, ends to tie up, prisoners to deal with. The rational part of Hermione understood this, but the rest of her was impatient and angry.

"Hermione," Ron was speaking again, trying to sound calm, but she could catch the desperate undercurrent. _She_ was supposed to be the strong one, the calm and rational one, the one who held everyone else together. _I can't handle this if you fall apart too_ , he seemed to be saying.

"We should find Remus or - or - " She groped for the name of someone who could still be alive, but managed to keep her voice mostly steady. "If they're - if we can't, then you - then you'll have to take charge, Ron." She tried to smile reassuringly, but her voice wobbled dangerously on his name. Neville had come, and was moving Harry's body under Madam Pomfrey's departing instructions. The mediwitch hastily moved in the direction of Ginny's outstretched arm, but Hermione followed their classmate with her eyes all the way to the great double Doors of Hogwarts.

She remembered the look in Harry's eyes, the way his fingers felt teasing against hers. She felt Ron's hand under her elbow, as they picked their way carefully through the fallen. She knelt beside him, threading her fingers through his hair at the sobs that racked him when the light left Charlie's eyes, and she wondered if there would ever come a time where she wouldn't feel such pain.

 **TBC**

 **Ready for another go?**

 **You may leave a review on your way out, if you like. I'll be happy to answer any questions as well.**

 _ **lorien**_


	2. Chapter 2

**Shadow Walker**

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **\- Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

* * *

 _ **Chapter Two:**_

 _ **But love won't cure the chaos, and hope won't hide the loss.**_

 _ **-Jars of Clay, "Surprise"**_

She was sitting next to Ron, and knew she was, but she couldn't really feel anything. Her limbs were heavy, wooden. The place where her shoulder touched his felt as if it were padded under several layers of thick clothing. Her nerves were sluggish, shrouded, trains running behind schedule. Her breathing sounded noisy in her own ears, but the speaker's voice drifted in from what seemed like a great distance. Wind snarled her hair and chafed at her cheeks, but it was like watching the whole tableau while hovering above herself.

She was at Harry's memorial service, and wondered how close she was to a psychotic break.

It wasn't really only _Harry's_ service, though he was clearly the focal point of it. They had lost so many, so many: Ron and Ginny, alone of the Weasleys surviving; all of the Hogwarts staff cut down like wheat before a scythe; Tonks had lived, but not Remus; Luna Lovegood, Parvati Patil, and Neville Longbottom had made it, but almost no one else from the erstwhile D.A. The Aurors had been decimated, as had much of the Ministry; bartering was commonplace, as only the autonomy of the Gringotts goblins kept the tottering economy from completely collapsing. Azkaban was full; the Ministry jail was full, and still there were not enough prosecutors, not enough guards, not enough MLE agents. The closest person in the line of succession surviving was an obscure little Undersecretary, who had previously worked at staffing the International Magical Embassies, and she was so clearly out of her league that the skeletal remains of the Wizengamot had called for a new vote, less than a fortnight after she took office.

The speaker droned on about heroism in general, and Harry's heroism in particular, and Hermione thought that she might scream. She wondered what people would do if she did. Most of them probably already thought she was barking mad. This man - this officious Bureaucrat, another one raised only by catastrophic war and death from utter unimportance- did not _know_ Harry. How dare he presume to know him?

Yet, she knew, most of those who had been able to call him friend were dead. And those survivors who had occupied Harry's inner circle were in no condition to speak of it. Hermione had always been one who'd been able to look squarely at her limitations - flying, for instance - and she knew that she could _not_ climb a dais and speak nostalgic, reflective, empty words about Harry Potter.

Especially not with Lucius Malfoy looking on from a place of honor.

Her derisive snort must have been audible, because Ron shifted slightly next to her, accidentally-on-purpose nudging her in the side. She dragged her gaze from the aristocratic coolness of the new Minister for Magic, and looked instead at the intricately carved tomb, brilliant white and polished to a high luster. Behind it, a marble plaque proclaimed this to be the resting place of Harry Potter, Hero for the Light, Destroyer of the Dark Lord, in letters fully 20 cm high.

He would have loathed it.

She was achingly conscious of the empty seat on her other side. Out of habit, she, Ron, and Ginny had scooted down to make four seats available, before realizing with heart-rending pangs that they only needed three. Hermione had not moved back, leaving that aisle seat open, wishing that he would come strolling in to take that seat, with such fervency that she thought her heart would burst. The familiar tightness was knotting its way around her throat, and her eyes were stinging.

She _would not_ cry here.

A subdued trickle of applause greeted the conclusion of the speaker's remarks. In the interim silence, there were more than a few sniffles, and Lucius Malfoy moved smoothly, in a swirl of gold and black fabric, to the podium.

"Honored citizens of Wizarding England," he began in a rich, cultured voice that rolled well to the ears. "I stand before you now as a symbol of a new Era - "

Lucius Malfoy had been the first Death Eater given a pardon, as, amazingly, there was absolutely no one left alive who would admit that he had been present at the battle. Neither Hermione nor Ron had ever seen him, though neither had any doubts as to his presence. Unfortunately, he had retreated back to his old claim of _Imperius_ , and "come on, you _know_ he had to be there" was not considered sufficient cause for arrest.

Still, his ascension to the position of Minister had come as a shock. It had not even registered as a possibility to the remnants of the Order until it was too late. The doddering Old Guard who made up the remnants of the Wizengamot had reacted in fear: knee-jerk reflex at the tottering tower of their world forcing them back to an old family, a _noble_ family, one who understood The Way Things Should Be.

 _This would never have happened if Harry had lived,_ Hermione thought, and her contempt of them was as a living thing.

"—have been grieving together as a people for our tremendous losses, and - " Narcissa had been found dead at Malfoy Manor, shortly after the battle, but it appeared that she had been dead for quite some time. Lucius claimed she'd been murdered by Voldemort, as repayment for defying him at the last, while he'd only barely escaped. "While not forgetting the sacrifices so bravely made by our comrades-in-arms - " He gestured gallantly down toward Harry's tomb. _Comrades-in-arms!_ Hermione felt the bile threaten to rise in her throat on a current of disgust. "—agree that we must move forward as a unified people once again. To this end, I have proposed a general amnesty for - "

Loud murmurs fluttered around the room like disturbed and resettling doves.

" - ighters, regardless of on which side they fought. This modification will include those already imprisoned. Of course, those whose actions can be proven to have been extraordinarily aggravating - " Hermione had a sinking feeling that this would somehow turn out to be impossible. "— be tried to the full extent of Wizarding Law. I know you will agree that - "

There was a buzzing sound in Hermione's ears, and it was growing louder. She clenched at the back of the chair in front of her blindly. How dare he - how _dare_ he… insinuate that the entire War could be blotted out, made as a slate wiped with a wet sponge. Voldemort was dead, but _one of them_ was in charge, and trying to pretend that this was nothing but a small spat among friends, that Harry's death was vanity, easily glossed over and forgotten.

" - for I want nothing more than justice to be served here, for Wizarding life to return to the quality we once so enjoyed. There were murders committed on both sides of the battle lines, and in light of this - as well as the immense loss of life sustained - I feel that the most expedient and rewarding path to restoration is to extend the olive branch of brotherhood to all wizards and witches, regardless of on which side they fought. Our society must be reconstructed, and that cannot happen if integral pieces wither away in prison. But ours is not an irreparable breach, not a fatal wound…" He extended one hand out toward the audience, a peacemaking smile on his entreating face. "I know it would be Harry Potter's fond wish that this world - our world, which he fought so gallantly to save - be mended as quickly as possible."

The rage and contempt spiraled up so quickly in Hermione that it made her dizzy.

"What a crop of dragon dung," she said, without worrying about keeping her voice down.

There was uneasy rustling among the crowd, though her remark was also greeted with a smattering of applause. Lucius eyed her icily, even while forcing his smile into a conciliatory mask.

"I am not ignorant of the after-effects of the trauma of battle and death that have been inflicted on our society," he said, staring at her squarely. "Rest assured every possible effort will be made to help restore our brave fighters to their full, pre-War capabilities."

He was calling her crazy. In front of everyone. At Harry's memorial.

She moved out into the aisle with a jerky, uneven motion, like something being clumsily unfolded, and watched as two MLE agents almost casually placed themselves in between the dais and herself.

"He would have hated this, you know," she cried out, her voice ringing in the open air, her arm arcing outward to encompass all of them. They seemed to recoil at her condemnation. "He would have hated what you're doing, and worse… what you're _allowing_ to happen."

The silence was deafening. Ron and Ginny stood, and for a moment, Hermione feared that they were going to try to placate her back to her seat. But they moved to flank her, a Trio once again - or was it a Quartet missing a member? - and she was able to pinpoint the exact moment that Lucius's patience was lost.

Something iron glinted deep within his eyes; his smile flickered, threatened to falter. He made a gesture with one hand, and the MLE agents began to move, though not without hesitation. Hermione knew that their prior closeness to Harry still made them somewhat untouchable - though the window for that seemed to be rapidly closing. Before the agents could even close half the distance, the three of them turned, in sync, and strode down the aisle, robes snapping impressively behind them.

"Screw you, Lucius!" Hermione shouted, and the triple crack of their Apparation resounded off of the nearby hills.

* * *

Hermione had to admit that Lucius Malfoy had a hell of an ability to spin events and perceptions in a direction favorable to him.

Two days after the Gryffindors' exit from the memorial service had made the front page of the _Prophet_ , the Minister himself had arrived at the Burrow, without an entourage, ostensibly for a "private" conversation with those who had known and loved Harry Potter best. However, Hermione reflected cynically, if Malfoy had truly had no idea that reporters had continually staked out the ramshackle home since Harry's death, then he was stupider than she'd thought. And though Lucius Malfoy was many things, she had an inkling that stupid was not one of them.

He knew that this meeting would be duly circulated in the press.

"Miss Weasley, Miss Granger, forgive my intrusion," he said, seemingly oblivious to their sullen reaction to his presence. He gave them a slight bow, one gloved hand pressed to an immaculate cravat. Hermione felt Ginny shrink slightly behind her, and knew that the younger girl was acutely aware of her own bare feet, worn jeans, and baggy t-shirt.

"How…unexpected to see you, Lucius," Hermione muttered faintly, grasping at the veneers of politeness, but vowing to herself that words like "honor" or "privilege" would not escape her lips.

"I wanted to speak with the two of you - and Mr. Weasley as well, if he is available." His eyes darted around in innocent inquiry, and Hermione fought the urge to roll her eyes. As if Ron - as if any of them - had any semblance of a demanding social schedule, licking their wounds in semi-exile as they were.

Not yet moving aside to admit the Minister, Hermione hollered inelegantly over her shoulder,

"Ron!" She waited until she could hear the indistinct sounds of shambling footsteps, and turned expectantly back toward their "guest".

"Perhaps we could sit down?" Lucius asked, and she could see his patience beginning to erode ever so slightly. The fraying edges of his composure gave her no small amount of satisfaction, though she still felt stiff, as if all of her bones had been wired into a fixed position.

"If you like," she gritted between her teeth, and allowed him inside. The periphery of her vision caught a camera flash, as she shut the weathered wooden door.

Ron had made it to the bottom of the staircase as they crossed into the living area, and swore vilely under his breath, whirling on her for an explanation.

"Hermione, what the hell?"

"I think he thinks there's been some kind of misunderstanding," she informed him with false sweetness, and looked back at Lucius, innocently, as if to add, _isn't that so?_

"I believe you have pre-judged me, based on my prior… associations," Malfoy began. "And I - "

"Associations with who? Voldemort? Positively unreasonable, that," Ron interrupted bluntly.

"I wanted to assure you, in person," the Minister continued, as if Ron had not spoken, "that our goals - our desires - for the Wizarding world are the _same_."

"I find it highly unlikely that you wish you were dead, Malfoy," Ron drawled again, and this time, faint color stained the former Death Eater's cheeks. There was no other outward sign that he'd even heard Ron.

"None of us wants the Wizarding world to perish. I'm extending the hand of amnesty to you three as well. I know you have been through much, and even though I continue to be so summarily insulted, I - "

"Amnesty?" Ron was incensed. " _We_ don't need amnesty - we were _in the right_. We didn't - "

"He needs us," Hermione interrupted, her voice as hard and flat as Hagrid's rock cakes. "Don't you?" She smiled at him, a tight, mirthless knife-slash across her face. "We would be the final jewel in your victory crown - the last of the Order, Harry Potter's nearest and dearest - as allies in your new regime! What did Neville Longbottom say to you when you… propositioned him? I'll wager he threw your man right out on his arse. If we joined you, it would silence any remaining nay-sayers, wouldn't it? Bring around the last hold-outs? The only thing that would be better would be having the endorsement of Harry Potter himself, but - even if he were alive - you know that it would _never_ happen."

The venom in her tone seemed to have startled even the Weasleys.

"What can be gained from dwelling on the past?" Lucius was still speaking in his politician's voice. "I simply ask that we begin to move on - together. Fighting me won't bring him back."

Hermione jerked her head as if she'd been slapped.

" _You_ ," she spat as if the pronoun were something filthy in her mouth. "You think that you can lecture me on recognizing the enormity of loss? Of _my_ loss - _our_ loss? There is no one in this _country_ who has lost as much as we have." With one hand, she indicated the two remaining Weasleys. "Even if Harry were here, I would still fight you. But we all know that if Harry were here, he would have put a stop to this madness before it even started." An indefinable sadness and regret shadowed her dark eyes. "I guess we're just not strong enough to do it for him."

Hermione's throat clogged up at the thought of somehow letting Harry down, and she fixed her gaze away from the others in the room, dwelling on the clock-shaped outline of unfaded wallpaper, opposite. Ron had thrown it out into the back garden on their first night back, having been unable to bear seeing so many of its hands blackened and permanently fixed on "Mortal Peril". The clock had landed in the overgrown grass with a satisfying splintering sound, and had, evidently, being carted off by gnomes, because no one had seen it - or its remnants - since.

"I urge you to consider your own … well-being, Miss Granger," Lucius spoke as he stood, casually inspecting his fine attire for spot or blemish. "And that of your friends, as well."

"Are you threatening us?"

"Consider it a friendly warning." Lucius' smile was anything but. "If you are not with us, you are against us - I'm quite sure you are a knowledgeable proponent of that particular philosophy. There is much to rebuild - and you three have the unique opportunity to stake your claim in the new order of things. You could name your position, wield your influence over circles that would only widen. Should you choose unwisely…" He lifted his shoulders as he left the end of the sentence dangling. "There will be no place for those who cling to the past."

Hermione glared back at him in stony silence, before she could finally trust herself to respond.

"I believe we are at an impasse," she finally noted. "I think you've said everything you came to say."

"I thought you not at all a fool - even though Muggle blood runs through your veins," Lucius said. "The Most Brilliant Witch of your Age, some have said. And yet you would throw it all away - for a corpse."

"Harry will never be dead, as long as those remain who love him and believe in what he represented," Hermione said, keeping her voice steady, though she was more than half-blind with tears. She refused to let them fall in front of Lucius Malfoy.

There was a comforting presence behind her, a warm arm around her shoulders.

"Get out of this house," Ron spoke stolidly, his wand in his hand, but not aimed at their visitor…yet.

"Take care that you do not regret these rash actions," the Minister warned, muttering a parting rejoinder as he opened the door. "You cannot eat ideals."

The three young people made no move to stop him, as he shut the front door and strode coolly down the path to the front gate, ever mindful of the reporters, even while in a high temper.

* * *

Ginny swept into the Burrow, bringing with her a rather chill wind, and flopped down on the sagging old sofa, letting out a noisy sigh as she unwound her scarf. Hermione was at the battered old desk, scribbling furiously with an old quill, an impressive coil of parchment already reaching the floor. She held up one finger at Ginny, without looking, in a signal to wait, and finished the end of her thought with a flourish and decisive punctuation. Finally, she swiveled around in the chair, and looked expectantly at the younger girl.

"Well?"

"Well…" Ginny drew out the syllable, savoring Hermione's expectation. "You are looking at the newest employee of the rebuilt Ministry - just a lowly clerk in the Magical Probate Department - but it's a start."

"Ginny, that's brilliant." Hermione's smile was genuine - or at least, what approximated genuine for her, as there was a shadow there that even the brightest smile never fully eclipsed. "Did you see Malfoy?"

"I did," Ginny said, amazed and admiring that Hermione's hunch had been so accurate. "As soon as the moron in human resources realized who I was, they marched me straight into the inner sanctum, past a right seedy lot of people waiting in the outer office - for favors, I reckon. Anyway, Malfoy did just what you thought. Wanted to `welcome me personally'. I told him just what we practiced. That I didn't agree with your high-handed attitudes, and that even though I was sorry Harry was dead, and I'd probably never trust _him_ \- I still wanted in on the fashioning of a new world. Told him that I was practical, I had always hated living in poverty, and I needed a job. I asked him please not to tell you. He seemed to think that amusing. I start tomorrow."

"Well done," Hermione replied. "Just remember - do your job, keep your head down. Don't do anything that might get you in trouble - right now, it's more important that we have someone on the inside."

"Two someones, actually," Ginny said suddenly, as if just remembering something. "Luna's there too. Got in as a junior-grade Unspeakable. I saw her in the Atrium. She says such daft things that I'll bet the goons at the Ministry have no idea where she stands. You know she's still with us, you _know_ she is."

"Sound her out, then - carefully - if you can," Hermione conceded.

Ginny nodded, then pushed against the cushions of the sofa, as if she would rise, but stopped.

"Hermione, what is it we're really trying to accomplish here?" she asked honestly, dashing her long red hair over her shoulder, so she could meet Hermione's gaze.

"You know… you know that Malfoy as Minister is _not right._ That he's made it this far is - is the height of folly, and I - I just know that we haven't even begun to see what he is capable of - and he'll mask it all for as long as he can - disguise it as being for the benefit of the people…" The phrase was said with not a little bitterness.

"But what good will it do? We're overwhelmingly outnumbered. Are we just fighting - just for the sake of fighting, kicking against the goads …just so we - just so we won't - "

"So we won't have to admit that we lost?" Hermione's voice sounded as dry as dead leaves.

"Well… yeah…" Ginny ventured slowly, not at all liking the look in Hermione's eye.

"If Lucius Malfoy continues down this path, unimpeded - if we don't stop him, stall him, hinder him - _something -_ then by the time the rest of the Wizarding world wakes up to what he's done, it will be too late. We'll have lost. And if we lose, then he died for _nothing_ , Ginny. Do you understand that? For _nothing._ " Raw agony flowed through her voice like electric current.

"And you can't let that happen," Ginny finished the thought declaratively.

"I've got to try," Hermione corrected her. "Because Harry would have tried. But in the end, it won't matter - not for me. I've already lost everything anyway."

"You still have us - me and Ron. Maybe Luna… Neville… It's not all gone, you know…" Ginny's voice was thistle-down soft, the type of voice one might use to comfort a very frightened, much abused child.

"I love him, Ginny," Hermione blurted suddenly, her tears beginning to make themselves known. Ginny did not seem surprised, by either the admission or Hermione's use of the present tense. "I never told him - and now I never can. I - I don't know how you move past the pain of that - it hurts so much here." She patted her chest, sounding distant and almost clinical. "I can barely breathe… like it could paralyze me, if I let it."

She felt ridiculous and small, speaking of her feelings to Ginny, who had lost infinitely more than she had. Being Weasleys, she and Ron had responded to the deaths with typical effusiveness. There had been screaming and cursing and thrown objects, including the clock, mostly in the shelter of a _Silencio_ ed Burrow. Hermione had had to _Reparo_ most of Molly Weasley's china, and had later found Ron crying amidst a cluttered pile of plugs and sockets in the shed. Yet, they had _each other_ , and somehow, that seemed to help them to stand. Hermione couldn't help but marvel at how they bore what shouldn't have to be borne.

"Listen to me," Ginny said, squaring Hermione's shoulders so that they were fully facing each other. "You may not have ever told Harry how you felt, but I think he knew - and I think he felt the same way."

"How do - ?"

"I saw you," Ginny said, and for the first time, disappointment flickered in her eyes. "At Hogwarts - that last day. It - the look in his eyes, when your hands touched - just your _hands_ , Hermione. It was - it was amazing… almost consuming, like it -" She shrugged her shoulders, at a loss. "Well, I've snogged him, and he never looked at me like that."

Her words sent a temporary thrill shivering through Hermione, but the comfort was slight, like medicated balm on the stump of a severed limb. What did it matter, how he or she had felt or not felt, what they had declared or left unsaid, what had been seen or heard or only intuited? What did it matter?

She couldn't have any of it back.

And before she knew it, she had leaned forward, collapsing on Ginny, all ungainly angles and jutting joints, feeling the scratchy wool of Ginny's loosened scarf beneath her cheek. Tears flowed down her cheeks, scalding like acid, and harsh sobs forced themselves from her convulsing throat.

And Ginny - _Ginny_ , the girl who had lived to know that her idol, her crush had been ruthlessly cut down on the cusp of victory, the girl who had lost her entire family, save one brother, in one lethal day, the girl standing amid the smoldering flames and smoking ruins of the only world she'd ever known - was patting her head, stroking strands of hair back from her sticky, wet cheeks, and making a soothing, white-noise sort of sound. And after a moment, when Hermione was completely drained, feeling as thick and groggy as if she'd awakened from a too-long nap, she sat up, deftly cast a Refreshing charm on herself, and dried the shoulder of Ginny's sweater. She sniffed noisily and with finality.

"Sorry about that," she said, and brushed off whatever Ginny was going to say in response, feeling acutely ashamed of herself.

It was the last time any of them ever saw her cry.

 **TBC**

 **The timeline on this chapter was left intentionally vague, but a couple of months elapsed between the Battle and the service (think of all the "triage" and damage control and restructuring before they could even hold such an event), and maybe close to that between Lucius' meeting and Ginny's job. There will be about 2 years covered before Harry's appearance to this Hermione, and it will be traversed fairly quickly.**

 **Reviews are always appreciated; the more, the merrier, says I. You may leave one on your way out, if you like.**

 _ **lorien**_


	3. Chapter 3

**Shadow Walker**

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **\- Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

* * *

 _ **Chapter Three:**_

 _ **She's just reminiscing; blood, sweat, and one thing's missing. She's been breaking up inside**_ _._

 _ **-Switchfoot, "Lonely Nation"**_

"I thought _you_ were supposed to be the responsible one," Ron hissed, darting an accusing glance at her as he stepped over a puddle. It wasn't raining, but had before, and promised to again. "We're not Glamored or anything. I don't think we should be doing this… Not like this, anyway." He tried to dodge the hanging fringe of the awning over Eeylops, but missed, and cursed, as a shower of water sprinkled down the side of his neck into his collar.

"How many times do I _have_ to keep telling you, Ron?" Hermione's words were bitten off and distinct, flying at him like so many little darts. "We haven't done anything wrong."

"Was I the _only_ one at Malfoy's little `conference' who thought he was making threats?"

"He can't do anything to us - he's bound by Wizarding law just like everyone else, and the Wizengamot - "

"He _makes_ the bloody law, Hermione. He's got the Wizengamot by the nose; else, he'd never have been elected in the first place - "

Hermione spat a warning at him to lower his voice. The dreary weather made Diagon Alley rather more sparsely populated than normal, which was lower still than in days of yore, but they were managing to attract attention. Even as they passed the bakery, two women in floured aprons stood in the doorway were nodding toward them and whispering behind their hands - _Harry Potter's best friends._

"We shouldn't have come here," Ron continued, albeit somewhat more sulkily. "We could've sent Luna or Neville - we could have done this by Owl."

"Gringotts only allows estate settlements to be done in person now," Hermione reminded him in her trademarked snippy tone, though most of the fight had gone out of her voice. Ron's shoulders had drooped even further as they passed the vacant joke shop that had once belonged to his brothers. The windows gaped like blind and empty eyes. Hermione pressed her lips together in sympathy and touched his arm, but he was gazing fixedly toward the grocer's and would not look at her.

They walked in silence for a time, but once they had reached the marble steps at the foot of the goblin's towering edifice, Ron had regained enough of his composure to remember why he was irritated.

"Why couldn't we have done this earlier then?" He challenged her, seizing on a new tack. "In the chaos of everything afterward, we'd have been less likely to be noticed."

"Honestly, Ron," Hermione's long-suffering sigh was perhaps more plaintive than in times past. "Don't you remember how long it took us to get the Dumbledore's Pensieve after he died? The Ministry kept it for as long as they legally could, trying to figure out what treachery it held. Thank Merlin Dumbledore hid the memories, instead of willing them to us directly."

"Sent us all on a sodding wild goose chase," Ron grumbled, but he seemed to concede Hermione's point. They were quiet as they mounted the stairs, both thinking of those difficult and frustrating days hunting for Horcruxes with almost nothing to go on. Hermione found herself yearning for those days, because even in the midst of flaring tempers, sleepless nights, cold food, paranoia, booby traps, and attacks, even then, they had been three - they had been whole.

Ron's pensive face mirrored her own, as he held open the large door for her to enter Gringotts' lobby. There were several queues, and people were scattered through out the large room, as goblins darted hither and yon on various business tasks. She and Ron seemed to attract attention almost immediately, and as Hermione's face began a slow burn, she let herself wonder if Ron had been right.

"Hermione!" called out a voice, clearly in greeting, but still discreetly low. She knew who it was without turning.

"Hi, Neville," she replied.

"What brings you here today?" There was no preamble, and concern laced his voice. Hermione fought the urge to roll her eyes. _Not Neville too_ , she thought. He carried some sort of official document, and shifted the rolled parchment from one hand to the other. The purple seal of Gringotts peeked out.

"Harry's will," she answered him. "I thought Ron was just being his usual paranoid self. Is something going on?"

"You didn't read the _Prophet_ this morning, did you?"

"I stopped taking it." Harry had always hated the periodical, and somehow, continuing to shell out galleons for it had seemed disloyal. Plus, she had been loath to give money to an organization so clearly acting as a mouthpiece for Lucius Malfoy. In the interests of staying `fully informed', however, she read Luna's copy in the evening, when Luna had finished and Owled it to her. She told Neville so.

Neville's mouth crimped in an expression akin to pity, as if he heartily wished that she _had_ read the paper that morning. Her eyes narrowed.

"What's wrong?" Her voice brooked no opposition, no stalling or smoothing over.

"It's begun," was all he said, but the portents of doom were easily discernible. She knew instantly to what he was referring.

"How is that even possible? How can people allow - ?"

"People are scared, Hermione. The economy is depressed, too many people have died - or disappeared. It's happened twice in twenty years! No one wants it to happen again, and he's promising a way to ensure it won't." He seemed to realize that he sounded like a ringing endorsement, and amended his tone. "I'm _not_ saying I agree with him, or with those who are placing their trust in him; I _am_ saying that I understand why they might…"

"Why they might what - be willing to throw over everything we fought for?" Ron queried sarcastically.

"Why they might feel as if he's their only option at this point." Neville spoke to Ron, but was watching Hermione. Ron's face took on an expression of unsurprised long-suffering.

"So what's he gone and done?"

"He's started implementing the Registry." Neville's voice lowered until it was nearly inaudible. Ron's eyes grew saucer-sized, and he grasped for Hermione's elbow.

"We need to get you out of here now!"

"Oh, honestly, Ron," Hermione groused, yanking her arm away from him, and rolling her eyes. "They're not going to drag me out of Gringotts in chains, with a hood over my head. It's too public; it's too soon."

"Only six months," Neville agreed, nodding sagely. "Not long enough for people to forget Harry Potter - and your relationship with him." His glance included both of them. "I'd say you're safe - for the time being."

"Is there a deadline?"

"By the New Year. Gives everybody forty-five days to register. Purebloods are exempt, of course."

"And then what happens? Yellow star sewn on Muggle-born's clothes?" Hermione's bitterness was easy enough to detect, though her Muggle reference was lost on Neville and Ron.

"Malfoy says there'll be no change, that law-abiding Muggle-borns are wizarding citizens as necessary as anyone else. He merely wants the information, numbers and locations of Muggle-borns and half-bloods, for statistical purposes and preventive measures."

Hermione snorted in derision, even though the ache in her chest was acute. The isolation she felt - even standing in a populous lobby with two close friends - threatened to smother her. Ron and Neville were pureblood, and therefore, immune. And Harry - half-blood Harry - who might have understood; hell, who would have prevented this from happening at all - was gone.

Somehow, there in the bank, she missed him more than ever.

"That's what he'll say, at first. How long before he starts reminding people that Voldemort was half-blood, therefore, half-bloods are not to be trusted? How long before the first Muggle-born perpetrating a heinous crime on wizardkind is caught red-handed and thrown into Azkaban with great fanfare, to be made an example of?"

"Are you - are you going to - ?" Neville asked, miming writing a signature. His question was hesitant, as if he'd already sussed out the vehemence of her response.

"The hell I am," she replied. "Those lists will be charmed; addresses will be automatically changed, if one moves. If they think I'll allow myself to be _tracked_ , like some kind of animal, they are sadly mistaken. And if you think that those laws are not going to be progressively more restrictive and abusive, then _you're_ sadly mistaken." She shot a warning look at Neville, who raised placating hands in her direction.

A goblin clerk became available for assistance, and Hermione walked toward him with clipped and decisive steps. Ron had to trot for a couple of strides to catch up with her.

"You know Neville doesn't think that you - " he began, as they arrived at the counter.

"I know," Hermione answered. "We're here for the processing of Harry Potter's bequests." Ron couldn't help but admire the cool authority in her voice, marveling at how she always managed to keep control, or at least maintain the illusion of doing so.

The goblin paused infinitesimally, darting measuring glances at both of them, and then descended from his wooden stool.

"This way, please."

He led them through a door, and through a veritable rabbit warren of corridors. Ron was fairly certain they had gone down one particular hallway more than once, when they arrived at a heavy and intimidating wooden door, studded with brass.

"Wand print and blood verification is required," the clerk informed them, tersely.

Hermione quickly cut her fingertip with her wand, and pressed both the bloody digit and the tip of her wand to a softly glowing plate beside the door. Ron watched her for a moment, nonplussed, and then copied her motions. When he had done so, the plate glowed green and the latches of the door disengaged with noisy clanks.

The room that greeted them looked surprisingly like a Muggle boardroom, except for the torches gleaming in heavy metal sconces along the walls. There was a long shiny conference table, green leather chairs, and floor-to-ceiling bookshelves lined with heavy tomes.

Another goblin, whose array of medallions pinned to his chest indicated his higher rank, sat at the head of the table, awaiting them.

"Granger, Weasley," he rasped. He gave no other movement or gesture of greeting. An abortive motion of his stumpy arm apparently indicated that they sit. Wordlessly, they both did so.

When the silence had stretched to the breaking point - Ron having shifted unsubtly in his seat several times - the goblin withdrew a heavy roll of parchment sealed in thick wax. He broke the seal, and unfurled the scroll halfway down the length of the table, but the odd angle and the archaic, heavily inked script made it impossible for either Hermione or Ron to read.

"You wish to claim the entitlements left you in one Harry Potter's last will and testament?" The question was calm, indifferent, and Hermione somehow felt that she was taking advantage, as if she'd been caught looting an abandoned house.

"Yes… sir," she tacked on uncertainly.

The goblin scrutinized the parchment for a few more moments, just because he could, Hermione figured.

"Very well. Your identity is in order. The documents in question are in order. Vukglut will escort you to the Potter vault." He was standing up, moving toward a door, smaller than the one through which they'd entered, and tucked unobtrusively into a dim corner.

"Wait…" Ron managed to speak before Hermione. The goblin rotated austerely toward him, brow ridge arched, as if to question Ron's temerity in saying anything at all. "You mean - you mean, that's it… what - what about the - the others…?"

"The entire Potter estate has been given into your joint custody," said the goblin, as if it were patently obvious. "Anyone else to whom Mr. Potter wished to bequeath something has predeceased you. If you'll excuse me…"

For a long terrible moment, Hermione and Ron stood in the official-looking opulence of the boardroom, staring at each other. They had not even begun to articulate this horror, a new, fresh way of reminding them how much was gone, when their escort rasped from his position by the main door.

"I'll escort you to the vault now, if you wish." The obsequiousness of the question covered his lofty disdain by only the thinnest of veils.

"Thank you," Hermione acquiesced faintly, and they meandered down the maze of corridors to the loading platform, where they endured a hair-raising cart ride to Harry's vault.

Vukglut opened the vault, and stood by the cart, politely putting up the front that he was thoroughly uninterested in anything they might do down here. Hermione stepped over the threshold, with a tight throat, and dry, burning eyes.

There were stacks and stacks of galleons and sickles, though the amount had diminished somewhat, since her last trip down here. Paintings were stacked in the corner, leaning against the back wall, next to several trunks holding Merlin only knew what, and there was a shelf holding a pile of rolled parchments, which Hermione assumed were deeds or titles, or perhaps receipts of investments. There was a clear glass cabinet to one side, full of antique vases and the like, glowing faintly with Cushioning Charms.

"So….er, what are we getting today?" Ron fidgeted, sticking his hands in his back pockets. "Might not be able to get back here for awhile."

"We're not coming back here, Ron," Hermione hissed at him. "We're taking it all."

" _Now?_ " Ron gaped.

"You heard Neville," Hermione reminded him. "And you - you weren't so far off the mark, either. Malfoy will be itching to get his hands on this. While the money might not be so important - " Ron snorted derisively. " - he shouldn't be allowed anywhere near these," she indicated the moldy looking scrolls, "or these," and a pile of ponderous looking tomes, thickly bound in cracked leather.

"How - how are we going to take all this?" Ron's gesture encompassed the entire vault.

"Honestly, Ron, are you a wizard or aren't you?" The teasing look and tone of voice were as light-hearted as Ron had seen Hermione in a long time.

It took quite some time to shrink or transfigure everything to Hermione's satisfaction. They had lined their jackets with rows of pouches, complete with Everfill charms, of course. A tiara became a pair of sunglasses. The paintings in the corner became a book of stamps. The rolls of parchment were a packet of tissues. At last, the vault was empty save for scattered detritus and cobwebs.

"Ready?" Ron breathed. He looked nervous, and Hermione thought, understandably so. It was difficult to remember that all they carried was, in fact, their property, that they weren't technically doing anything wrong. The myriad of spells would have been utterly impossible in the vault of another.

"One more thing." She cast an Illusory spell of Duplication, and in a single flash of light, the vault appeared to be filled entirely once again. Eying her work with satisfaction, she thought that it wouldn't fool goblins and probably wouldn't fool cursebreakers, but it might fool the Ministry.

Their escort came to reseal the vault, and, if he noted that anything was different, his stoic facade did not give it away. They made their way back to Gringotts' lobby in silence.

The large entry-room looked no less crowded when they surfaced, and Neville was waiting for them by the door, tossing his scroll lightly from one hand to the other in twitchy boredom.

"Neville, you didn't have to stay." Hermione's tone said that she was glad he had.

"I didn't mind," he replied amiably. "Hadn't seen you two in awhile anyway. D'you want to grab a bite to eat?"

Before either of them could reply, there was a thunderous trumpeting sound that rattled the panes of the windows, and the double doors that served as Gringotts' main entrance flew open. The three of them stared at the dim cloudy light that flooded the marbled lobby floor, instinctively shrinking back and drawing their wands, as they assessed the situation. Hermione keenly felt the slight weight of Harry's shrunken inheritance, as if it were a millstone around her neck.

" _Goblin Bankers!_ " boomed a magically-enhanced voice. " _You are hereby under notice that this bank is now under Ministry control. You will cede all keys and magical codes effective immediately, under Financial Degree 114-20-A. Attempts to deny access to any part of this facility will be met with force. You will be given transport back to the_ _Goblin stronghold of your choice in the_ _Black Forest or the Ural Mountains._ _You will prepare for departure immediately."_

"They're - they're deporting all the Goblins?" Ron's voice was a wheezy, disbelieving shadow of its usual self.

"They won't stand for it - they won't allow - " But Hermione's voice was weak too; she had seen too much happen that she'd thought wouldn't be allowed.

"Well," Ron added, apparently thinking of the defenses the goblins would try. "Too bad they don't have a dragon down there anymore."

The Ministry official, whose wand had been Amplifying his voice, strode through the flung-wide doors, with a troop of black-cloaked and hooded Enforcers moving in step behind him. The Enforcers had been brought into play after the war, as a quasi-police force/militia for the function of keeping order in a society struggling to keep its head above water. Lately, there had been darker rumors of their actions against wizarding populace, though nothing proven.

Already the goblins had disappeared, as the humans either pressed themselves into the walls, trying to look as unthreatening as possible, slipped out a side entrance, or cheered or whistled, albeit somewhat half-heartedly. They were largely ignored; clearly, the Enforcers had no quibble with the bank's customers. One Enforcer tried the door through which Hermione and Ron had been led, only a few minutes before.

"It's sealed," he said.

"Blast it," came the order.

"This ought to be fun," Ron muttered. Everyone knew the extent of the goblins' prowess for engineering and manufacturing.

But then the Enforcer drew out something from the depths of the swirling black cloak. Hermione could see a glint of silver. He aimed it at the door and murmured something in a tongue that Hermione didn't understand. The resulting shockwave from the pulse of energy made her ears ring and the very bones in her skull vibrate like a struck gong. There was a crackling noise, like the flow of electric current, and then the door was gone, a blackened, smoking hole where it had once been.

A small goblin had been in the process of retreating down the now exposed corridor, its arms laden with bulky scrolls, all affixed with purple seals. The noise of the explosion caused him to freeze and slowly rotate back toward the lobby, shock and horror clearly etched on his grotesque little face.

Hermione then realized what the silver object was.

"They've gotten their hands on Goblin talismans," she whispered. "How in the hell…?"

A quick gesture from the goblin's taloned hand Vanished the scrolls in a blink of light, and this seemed to anger the Lead Enforcer.

"You," he said, "you will take us into the vaults, and you will give us access to what we require." His tone was arrogant, imperious, and Hermione wanted to writhe in shame for her species.

The goblin said nothing, the contempt obvious, and bared his teeth with defiance. Hermione watched the red flush slowly rise up the Lead Enforcer's face.

"It can be an example for the others."

The goblin seemed to realize what this meant as soon as Hermione had, and raised both palms toward the humans, in a gesture that would have seemed like surrender on anyone else. White-blue light seemed to boil on his hands, waiting.

His magic met that from the silver talisman in mid-air, and there was a deafening crack. More Enforcers joined the side of the first, wands out.

"Wait!" Hermione cried.

"Hermione, shut up," Ron said. "Let's get out of here." He gestured toward the side door at the far end of the lobby.

"No, look - look what they're doing. He can't fight so many. _Stop!_ " Her voice was barely audible above the din. Several other goblins had crept from their hidey-holes to join the fray, but they were still outnumbered - and wandless.

"Hermione, come _on_!" He was trying to drag her now, appealing to Neville for help, though her murderous glare was keeping the latter at a safe distance.

A wave of Goblin magic flowed past them, from a new direction, and they realized that a small band of goblins were concealed behind a tapestry, just beyond them. An Enforcer noticed the new battlefront, and called a warning, swiveling quickly toward the tapestry, and raising her wand.

"Please don't do this," Hermione pleaded, stepping towards the tapesty, at the same time as the Enforcer fired her wand.

"Hermione!" Ron yelled, and then a heavy weight fell into her, knocking the wind out of her, as she hit the cold marble tile with enough force to make her see stars.

Ron was still yelling her name, though it seemed very far away, and someone shrieked Neville's name once. The thing on top of her was heavy, pressing all the air out of her lungs, and she tried to will the room to stop spinning.

Finally, the weight was lifted, and Ron's face came into view, still calling her name in distinct panic.

"I'm - I'm alright, Ron," she said, feeling more than a little nauseated. "Just … hit my head. Neville?" As Ron lifted her carefully to her feet, she had caught sight of Neville's prone form, the weight that had collided with her, knocked her down. " _N - Neville?_ "

"He's dead, Hermione," Ron said heavily.

Hermione's eyes were dry and burning, fixed on the body; she could _not_ believe it. _Neville_ \- dancing with Ginny, babying his _Mimbulus Mimbletonia,_ returning to Hogwarts after graduation to lead the students in insurrection - it was unthinkable that he could be dead that quickly, without warning or farewell. Ron was still holding her as if he'd never let her go again, but his cold stare was fixed toward the main fight, which was now beginning to wind down, the humans clearly the victors. There was no sign of the goblin that had been carrying the parchments, and the tapesty now flapped emptily behind them.

The lone Enforcer, who had fired was still standing there, wand arm limp at her side, hood down, staring at Neville in horror.

"Parvati?" Hermione's voice was a disbelieving squeak. Ron's ears began to slowly turn red.

The remaining Patil took a step back, as if driven by their censure.

"It was - it was a job… I - I thought it was just a job."

"You were using _Avada Kedavra_?" It was both like and unlike a question, and there was no accusation there, just disbelief.

"They - they said you couldn't Stun a goblin - that - that it wouldn't work… I - I wasn't trying to - I didn't - " Tears were streaming down her face, coating her cheeks like shiny lacquer.

"I suppose you are skilled," Hermione said calmly, after a moment. "Harry did train you, after all."

A sob burst from Parvati at the mention of Harry's name.

"I didn't know - I didn't think it - "

"Yes," Hermione interrupted, seeming to cordially agree. Her voice was lifeless enough to give Ron the creeps. "You didn't think, did you?"

She turned, woodenly, Disillusioned Neville, and Levitated his body from the floor.

"Let's go, Ron. Tell Malfoy to have fun with his new toy," she directed the jibe over her shoulder at Parvati.

"Hermione, _please_." The plea escaped from Parvati's lips among the faint weeping.

Hermione didn't turn around, moving automatically toward the side entrance, waving her wand disinterestedly to direct Neville. Ron thought she looked for all the world like a livingInferius. Somehow, he felt awful, hollow at the thought of leaving Parvati alone there, swallowed whole by the knowledge of what she'd done and that she could never go back, never undo it. Then, he saw Neville's hovering corpse, and wasn't sure who to loathe - or to blame.

"Hermione, maybe we should - "

"She's made her choice," Hermione looked over her shoulder at Parvati one time, her eyes as cool and impersonal as glacial ice. "And it's cost her everything, hasn't it?" Something in Ron's face must have stricken Hermione, for her own features softened. "Come on," she amended. "We can put him by his Gran. He'd like that, don't you think?"

"Here," Ron said, holding the door open by way of reply. "Let me help too."

 **TBC**


	4. Chapter 4

**I know everyone wants to see "our" Harry meet up with Other Hermione from her POV, and then where she goes following his visit. That is what I want to focus on also: how she got to be the person Harry found, and what she did after. I was having trouble wrangling out how much of Hermione's personal "resistance" against the establishment I was going to include, so the answer is: Not much. It will be referenced obliquely, but the political/espionage angles are going to be minimalized save where it advances the main plot. Hope that sits well with everyone. Once we hit their meeting, it should move better.**

 **Shadow Walker**

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **-Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

* * *

 _ **Chapter Four:**_

 _ **Two scared little runaways hold fast to the break of daylight.**_

 _ **-Switchfoot, "The Shadow Proves the Sunshine"**_

Hermione looked up from the cauldron she was stirring, as the Burrow's front door flew open abruptly, banging against the wall. A bristly rustle met her ears, along with a few well-chosen curse words, and the tramp of wet snow boots. Ron was completely hidden behind a wall of pine branches, until he let it fall to the floor with a final swish and muffled thump.

"Damn, that's heavier than it looked," was all he said, pretending not to notice the look of bewildered resignation she was giving him. He shook the snow from his ginger hair, and began to unwind his scarf.

"What the _hell_ is that?" came a voice from beyond Ron, out of Hermione's line of sight. Ginny was on the stairs. Ron looked helplessly at Hermione, who shrugged as if to say, _you made this dumb decision on your own, you handle it._

"It's a – it's a Christmas tree, Gin." He tried to smile at her, the same tentative way one would try to placate an angry animal.

"I know what it is," his sister amended, sounding more weary than wrathful. " _Why_ did you bring it here?"

"I thought we – I thought it might take our minds off – it's Christmas… they wouldn't want us to – " He stopped, as both he and Hermione saw Ginny's features shutter and close off.

"They're _dead,_ Ron. There's no way to know what _they'd_ want us to do." Her voice was withering, almost Draco Malfoy-esque in its condescending cruelty. "And there's certainly nothing to celebrate."

She turned swiftly, and marched back up the stairs, quiet until she reached her door, which she opened and shut with decisive force, the sound distorted through a hasty and ill-cast _Silencio_. Ron made a move toward the stairs, but stopped at Hermione's gentle remonstrance.

"Ron, don't." She knew how Ginny felt, knew the pangs of missing someone so acutely that one nearly choked on it. She _longed_ for just one more glimpse of Harry's crooked smile, his striking eyes, the half-hopeful, half-wary look that disclosed how unworthy of friendship he believed himself to be. "Ginny's – she's had a bad day at work – Merlin knows I couldn't handle working at that awful place, interacting with those… those _people_ , and… ever since Neville…" She trailed off into silence, and both of their faces reflected the pall of grief that hung on the room like a heavy curtain. It didn't take any skill at Legilimency for Hermione to know that Ron was also thinking about their fallen classmate.

"She shouldn't – we … we can't keep living like this, Hermione."

"Living like what, Ronald?" Hermione's tone was acrid. Ron looked at her dubiously, clearly aware of the dangerous path he was treading.

"Like _this._ Constant mourning, gloom … we've frozen Time back to that bloody Day, and we can't ever go forward. It's like having Dementors camped out in the bloody garden."

"So you want us to what, Ron? Have a party?" Ron sighed the frustrated sigh of one who is being deliberately misunderstood, but Hermione plunged on. "So sorry H—Harry had to go and die, so that you had to deal with all of us being _in a bad mood_." Her voice wobbled and cracked a little on the last phrase.

"That's not what I meant, Hermione," Ron said mildly. His face was so uncharacteristically gentle that it made her want to weep anew, made her want to think of something incredibly swotty to say, just so he'd yell at her. But her inborn forthrightness made her answer honestly, made her acknowledge that she was lashing out blindly, like a wounded creature striking at whatever lay within reach, whether or not it was that which had caused the pain in the first place.

"I know it's not."

"I want us to … to make an _attempt_ , Hermione. Christmas seemed like a decent time to do that, to – I dunno – to pretend, maybe, not to actually _forget._ I know it's hard, and I know it still hurts like hell. Of all people, Ginny and I – we know." He kicked at the tree, sending up a fine spray of water where the snow had melted. His features seemed pinched and older somehow, and Hermione was stricken by how much he resembled his father. His gaze drifted over the empty room, and he seemed to be seeing it as it had been: warm and noisy and full of life. He sighed. "Everything seems so bleak right now, but – but wouldn't… wouldn't _he –_ wouldn't all of them want us to live our lives, to try to make the best of things? I mean, he bloody well lived in a cupboard, and he still – he didn't let it change who he _was_. We're – we're walking around here like ghosts, like shadows of who we used to be. We might as well have died on the battlefield with everyone else."

"I sometimes wish I had," Hermione admitted softly. For a moment, Ron looked like he wanted to take her to task, but then his rangy shoulders slumped, and he admitted,

"So do I."

The house was utterly silent, save for the soft frothy noise of Hermione's concoction bubbling in the cauldron. Hermione _could_ feel it, like Ron had described: almost tangible despair, Dementor's ice in her soul, a heavy cloak on her shoulders, burdensome and ponderous. And yet, she wasn't sure she could give it up. The anguish paved her path to Harry, was her last remaining link to him, and she clung to it fiercely.

And yet… she could almost hear _him_ too, fancied that she could see the reproach in his vivid gaze. The repressed childhood he'd endured, the constant reminders of what a burden he was to his guardians, had often made him worry that he was causing someone unnecessary trouble. She could only imagine how he'd feel if he knew how his three dearest friends were existing, how their grief would grieve him.

"I've thought about leaving," she blurted suddenly, and then looked surprised that she'd said it. Ron's Adam's apple worked up and down in his neck as he swallowed, but she registered with some astonishment that he _didn't_ look surprised.

"Where?" was his simple question.

"Back to my parents. Back to … a Muggle life. Where I can…" She struggled to define her expectations of abandoning the world where her heart had resided since she was eleven years old.

"Where you can pretend none of this ever happened?" Ron spoke lightly, with the feigned nonchalance of one who is desperately trying to sound controlled. The anguish reared up within her, sank its taloned claws further into her chest. _None of this ever happened_ … she imagined going to Oxford, going to museums, clubs, restaurants, whiling away her time with new Muggle friends who had no idea that who Harry Potter even was, or that another world was locked in its death throes. It was a dream and a nightmare all at once.

 _Harry!_ She caught her breath suddenly, feeling as if he'd died all over again.

"I said I'd thought about it. I didn't say I was going to do it."

"Couldn't say I'd blame you if you did. It'd be nice to have that option… to just chuck it all, I mean."

Hermione's indignant gasp at the inelegant phrase bespoke her true feelings, her guilt that 'chucking it' would be exactly what she was doing, abandoning them, abandoning _him_ and everything he'd fought for, _died_ for.

"Why couldn't you and Ginny have that option too?" she asked. Ron laughed bitterly.

"Snap our wands? Function without magic?" he shook his head. "It's ingrained in our lives even more than it is in yours. I probably couldn't even pass a Muggle driving test without Confunding the instructor. And for better or for worse, it is our world, it's all we know… 'Sides, I'm not the one Lucius has painted a target on." He nodded toward the parchment on the kitchen table, half-furled from where it had been attached to the leg of an officious Ministry owl. "What're you going to do with those?"

Hermione's eyes were distant as she stirred her cauldron again, but she managed to crack a harsh half-smile.

"What would I _like_ to do with them? Or what am I actually going to do with them?" She strode over to the heavy wooden table, and lit the papers with her wand. Ron made a muffled exclamation of protest, as the flames flared up briefly and then died. He was able to make out _Hermione J. Granger, Registered Muggle-born,_ in fluid calligraphy, before the parchment was consumed and ashes fluttered down to frost the table's surface.

"Mightn't it have been better to mull it over briefly first?"

Hermione raked him with an incredulous look. "Mull over what? I certainly wasn't going to sign it, now or ever."

"We could've faked…" Ron began, but she overrode him before he could finish.

"Lucius Malfoy knows exactly where I stand, and will continue to stand." Her eyes took on a gleam, as she seemed to suddenly come to a decision; she almost looked like the Hermione he remembered. "I'm going to fight his injustices every way I can, for as long as I can. If nothing else, we can irritate the hell out of him, frustrate his attempts to subjugate non-Purebloods, and make _sure_ that people don't forget Harry." She seemed to suddenly realize her plural pronoun, and turned beseeching eyes on Ron, reaching out to clasp his hand. " _We_ can fight him… can't we?"

"You know I'm with you, Hermione," Ron said. She lifted her other hand, so that his large fingers were sandwiched between all ten of hers, and fixed him with a grateful smile.

"I think we should start an underground network – a Wireless program or a periodical, something to get out word of what's _really_ going on. And we have Ginny and Luna on the inside. They could probably get information…maybe other contacts…" She looked as animated as Ron had seen her in several months, before their world had been obliterated.

"All of that is well and good, Hermione," Ron said, clearing his throat. "But if you don't sign the registration papers, then they're going to arrest you. Probably paint you as some crazed vigilante who can't get over Harry's death, splash it in all the papers... "

"I _won't_ sign them, Ron."

"Then we can't stay here." His voice was quiet, and there was a new inflection in it, one that she had not noticed before. Her expression softened at his immediate offer to accompany her, but she chose to ignore the underlying tone.

"Do you think Ginny will be willing to leave?" She kept her voice brisk.

"'Ginny' should stay here," came from the doorway, and she and Ron both jumped as Ginny entered the kitchen. Her hair was disheveled, and her face still held traces of redness and puffiness that even a Refreshing charm couldn't quite cover up, but she seemed mostly composed.

"We can't leave you here alone," Ron immediately blustered. His sister waved him off with an airy hand gesture.

"I'm an adult, Ronald. And I have a job. A _legitimate_ job, and one that can help us. If I go with you, the Ministry will either sack me, or follow me to you, and neither of those options is acceptable. We should work out a contact system between you and me and Luna before you go." She read both of their appraising looks. "I'll be fine."

"Well…" Hermione drew out slowly, her eyes moving back and forth between the siblings. "We've got to be gone before the deadline expires. That means we've got about one week to find a place, ward it, ward the Burrow, set up…" Her voice wobbled into silence. The Weasleys were regarding her gravely. It wasn't as if any of them were strangers to a sort of "outlaw" status, but it felt like a point of no return, a step off of a precipice, a decision made with no Harry, nor hope of him.

 _Going forward…_ Ron's words rang suddenly in her ears. Was that what this was? _Maybe,_ she conceded, _but I'm not going to forget, and I'm not going to allow what Harry fought for to die._

* * *

It was late. As they opened the kitchen door that led to the Burrow's garden, the warmth and light spilled its bounds to the shadowy black, but was soon swallowed up and consumed. Hermione stepped through the doorway, and her eyes flickered back in the direction of the clock-shaped outline on the faded wallpaper. A gust of icy wind cut through her like a blade, and she sucked her breath in through her teeth. She pivoted on one heel, making a scuffing sound in the dirt, and turned back toward the house.

Ron was standing in between her and the house, hands shoved in pockets, his eyes roving over the humped dark shape of the house with undisguised longing. Ginny was standing on the threshold, leaning against the jamb, her hair twisted into a messy updo, her eyes dark and brimful with sorrow. Fingers of wind tangled in the wayward strands, and tossed them around her face.

For a long time, nobody spoke. The mournful solo of the wind in the trees seemed to echo their emotions adeptly. Finally, Hermione said, struggling to speak through a tight throat,

"The wards will activate at midnight, Ron."

"Ginny…" Ron breathed. He sniffed loudly, and put his sleeve up to his eyes. Hermione couldn't see his face, but she could see Ginny's. The younger girl looked frail and weary, as if an enormous burden were weighing her down.

"I'll be fine, Ron," Ginny said, entreating him wordlessly to at least pretend to believe her. "The wards you and Hermione have set up – they're top-notch. And … and as far as any of _them_ are concerned, I'm a loyal employee, right?"

"Until your brother and the unregistered Muggle-born he's aiding and abetting disappear, on the eve of her arrest," Ron muttered grimly.

"So they take me in for questioning." Ginny shrugged. "They've got nothing. I won't know where you are. Nothing here can lead them to you – almost nothing," she amended quickly.

"Have you got it on?" Hermione asked suddenly. Ginny nodded and clutched at something hidden beneath her shirt.

"I won't take it off."

Ron moved toward her then, squashing her into a fierce hug on her last words. Ginny let one sob escape before hugging him as if her life depended on it.

"Be careful, Ginny. _Please_."

His sister nodded, apparently not trusting herself to speak, and she moved toward Hermione, arms open. Their embrace was a little stiffer, but no less heartfelt.

"You have always been the strong one, Hermione," Ginny said. "Be strong for him, like you were for Harry."

"Of course," Hermione's murmur was almost automatic. She couldn't dwell too much on Ginny's words; they danced too closely to wounds that would never fully heal. _Who is there to lend strength to the strongest?_

Finally, Ginny straightened, looking businesslike, and tucking the loosened strands of hair behind her ears. "Okay. Do it."

Clearly lost, Ron was already opening his mouth to question his sister, when Hermione raised her wand.

" _Confundus."_

Ginny's eyes went unfocused, and she smiled at both of them blearily. Before she could say anything, Hermione had gently taken her by both shoulders and steered her to a kitchen chair, sitting her down where a steaming cup of tea waited. She exited, shut the door firmly, locked it with her wand, and turned to face Ron's onslaught.

"You – you _Confunded_ her?" He was utterly flabbergasted, but Hermione could see the anger rising. "We're leaving her alone, at the mercy of who knows what kind of people – and you – you – "

"It was her idea. She put Dreamless Sleep in the tea as well. When she wakes up, the details of our departure should be very fuzzy. They're going to question her, Ron. There's no way to know how intensively. We've got to cover our bases, or it's all for nothing."

"I – I know, but…" He seemed to want to protest, but was unsure how to proceed.

"Come on." She thumbed the straps of her knapsack more securely onto her shoulders. "We've got to make it to the property line before everything turns on." She moved at a brisk stride over the uneven ground, using only the barest hint of light from her wandtip.

Ron walked slowly at first, backward, drinking in the sight of the only home he'd ever known, once a-brim with love and light and laughter; now just a shell of what it had been, empty save for memories and ghosts and sorrow – and his baby sister, sitting alone in the deserted kitchen, wondering who had been nice enough to make her tea. He tripped over a protruding rock, nearly fell, and swore. Hermione could hear the tears clogging his voice. Her heart contracted in sympathy, but she said nothing, intent on the shadowy outline of a hedgerow. Ron turned away from the Burrow, squared his shoulders, and fell in stride with her, as they ducked through the clinging brambles of the hedge.

"The Portkey will activate in five minutes," she told Ron, as they kept close to the hedge, staying in the deepest of the shadows. They came to the large spread of an oak tree, and Hermione stepped close to it, her hands roving carefully over its trunk before reaching into a knothole at its heart.

"Are you ready?" she asked him. She was referring to more than just the activation of the illegal Portkey – a tarnished ring of old keys – hooked on one of her fingers. Ron's eyes were like a stranger's. Hermione thought of the exchange she and Ron had had the night he'd brought home the Christmas tree. _We might as well have died on that battlefield with everyone else. I sometimes wish I had. So do I._ In a way, they all _had_. Standing there, in near-pitch darkness, with Ron, with the tangible _absence_ of Harry – it was clear that the people they had once been were gone forever, hurtled into the abyss, into the "next great adventure" as surely as if they'd stopped breathing when Harry had.

"Ron?" she prodded again, when no answer was forthcoming.

"She's all I've got left," he blurted clumsily. Hermione reached out to lay light fingers on his forearm.

"No, she's _not_." She tried to infuse heartfelt compassion into her voice, but was unsure how much he was actually registering.

Ron took a deep breath, and glanced back in the direction of the Burrow, though it lay hidden beyond a gentle rise and a small copse of trees. He met her gaze squarely, the low wand-light reflecting in his eyes.

"I know. I'm ready," he said, and it was more like a sigh of acquiescence than actual words. He slid his finger alongside Hermione's and hooked it around the opposite side of the key ring.

There was the merest hint of a rustle, an almost soundless surge of power, and they both looked back toward the house with simultaneous and abrupt motions.

"Wards are up." They were as cut off from Ginny and the Burrow, as if an insurmountable wall had sprung up between them.

"And that – this thing you've worked up between the two of you," Ron asked. "Are you sure it will work? A necklace seems an awfully delicate thing to base this on."

"It's perfect – or as near to it as we can get. The pendant is password accessible only, so there's no chance of someone activating it accidentally. If someone tries to dismantle it, all they'll find is a portable Bluebell Flame. But Ginny says the password and the spell, and her little candle pendant becomes a Mini Floo."

"Just large enough to get a preset Portkey through," Ron finished for her, in the singsong tone of one who has heard something many times before. "That covers emergency exits, but doesn't cover Veritaserum or torture or…"

"Ron, she's practically the only remaining member of a decimated blood traitor family. She has no money, no influence, and any connections she once had are gone. Lucius Malfoy won the government through legal channels; he's still trying to put on the charade of legitimacy. He wouldn't do anything to jeopardize that. He can come after me, make an example of me, because as of now, I'm breaking the law. But why would he go after Ginny – and risk making her sympathetic… a friend of Harry Potter, and the lost, last daughter of an old Wizarding line?"

"You're just like Harry," Ron told her with no small amount of weary amazement. She opened her mouth to reply, but at that moment, the Portkey swirled them away.

They rematerialized in the living area of a tiny stone cottage. Ron staggered a bit upon landing, and a wooden chair slid noisily along the slate floor as he collided with it.

"Mind the furniture, Ron," Hermione said absently. " _Lumos!_ " A flick of her wand sent small orbs of light arcing into the waiting lamps, and the little room was cozily illumined. They both stood and regarded it rather dispassionately. The kitchen was basically a wood-burning stove, sink, and table; through an arched doorway were two bedrooms and a tiny loo. Hermione could feel, rather than actually see, the oppressive pine forest threatening to smother the tiny building from all directions. They knew, from their reconnaissance and preparations, that even in the brightest part of the day, only filtered sunlight made it to the woodland floor.

Hermione eyed the fireplace with askance, knowing that the Floo Network would be monitored for her, once the Ministry realized she had not registered, had no intentions of registering. Ginny's candle pendant was for emergencies only. She began to realize just how cut off and forlorn their new dwelling place made her feel.

"The wards will let us know the movements of any human movement up to 200 meters. No Apparation save our own, no magic save our own. We're as safe as we can possibly be – under the circumstances," Hermione informed him, but she knew that Malfoy would continue to look for her, that his pride would demand nothing less. The Ministry would be searching for loopholes, developing innovations, counter-measures. She only hoped that Luna and Ginny could keep them appropriately apprised.

Hermione thought once again of the irony of what they were doing: the instinct to flee, to hide, to preserve oneself, to survive, coming to the forefront, even though they had both admitted at least a partial desire for death.

Ron strode through the archway and into one of the bedrooms. Hermione heard the creak of springs as something heavy, presumably his knapsack, landed on the bed. There was a moment of rustling, and he reappeared, cupping something in his hands.

"Brought this for you," he said laconically, and opened his hands over hers.

"What on earth?" she murmured as a small, irregularly shaped black object fell into her palms.

"'S'a transmitter," Ron explained. "It belonged to … Fred and George. I thought you could use it to – to, you know… broadcast our dissension. It's Unplottable, but I don't know what new tricks the Ministry will have up their slimy sleeves."

Hermione felt a real smile spread over her face, as she cupped the small device.

"Thank you, Ron. I was afraid we'd have to use Muggle methods, and wasn't sure if any magical folk would even be able to hear it. This is far better."

"You're welcome." His voice was warm with sincerity and something else that drew her attention away from the transmitter to his face. There was something in his gaze that set alarm bells off in her brain, something that had not exactly grown into longing or desire, but more like wistfulness or fledgling hope. Hermione supposed that it was only to be expected: surviving harrowing experiences tended to bond people together, and they were in this cabin alone…

And yet, Harry's loss was still as a knife wound in her gut, and she found herself taking a couple of involuntary steps away from him, hasty and graceless movements. Her face colored brilliantly; she might as well have shouted her rejection at him.

The pinched forlorn quality began to creep back into his face, not unlike the encroaching spread of ice across the surface of a gray winter lake.

"Ron…" There was a plea in her voice for understanding, for absolution, but his upraised hand squelched her voice as surely as a _Silencio._

"Where do you want to set it up?" he said, and his voice was almost normal. "There's not a clear line in any direction, but it looked like southern-facing would be the most likely."

"Th – that corner," she gestured, following his lead, and indicated the back corner of the small living area, opposite the fireplace.

In the ensuing silence, broken only by shifting furniture and softly spoken spells, Hermione wondered if they could overcome the tension that seemed like a new and unwelcome visitor, or if it would rise up and consume them both.

 **TBC….**


	5. Chapter 5

_**Shadow Walker**_

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **-Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

* * *

 _ **Chapter Five:**_

 _ **Now all the demons look like prophets, and I'm living out every word they speak.**_

 _ **-Jars of Clay, "Work"**_

They'd been expecting something of the sort at some point, but it still startled both Hermione and Ron quite badly one evening, when the fire suddenly birthed a miniature green tongue of flame at its heart. But before their wands had even been fully raised, a partially singed scroll had been shoved through. It landed with a chuff of embers on the hearthrug, and the green flame winked out as though it had never existed.

Hermione and Ron exchanged glances. A few tendrils of smoke wafted up from the scroll and disappeared. Without having to voice any kind of instruction, both inhabitants of the remote cabin smoothly moved into action. Ron went to do a sweep of the grounds and check the wards. Hermione Levitated the scroll and made sure there were no hidden Portkeys or nefarious hexes worked into it, rotating it with her wand and examining it from all angles.

"We're clear," Ron informed her succinctly, closing and latching the door with a flick of his wand, as he re-entered. "What's it say?"

"I think it's from Luna. It's in code. Some kind of ancient rune." Hermione squinted at a line in the scroll at eye level, where it was still hovering. "Could be a Germanic Goblin variant. Trust Luna to pick something so obscure less than two hundred people in the world could even hope to translate it."

Ron almost smiled.

"And how long will it take you?"

Hermione did not even look up from the parchment. "At least four hours." She traced a couple of figures in the air with her wand, clearly thinking to herself, lips moving slightly. She shook her head and blew air upward in exasperation. "Make that six. It looks like she's anagrammed everything as well."

"What can I do?"

The question caught Hermione by surprise, and a grateful smile flashed onto her face before she even realized it.

"It looks like I'm going to need the Gringotts Reference volume, Dumbledore's notes on the European dialects of 12th century Goblins, and the Gobbledygook-English dictionary. Oh and my Advanced Arithmancy text. Don't _Accio_ the notes. Dumbledore put a Scattering Charm on them. We'd be forever gathering them all back up." Hermione was speaking as she efficiently Summoned parchment, quill, and ink from a drawer in the roll top desk opposite the sofa. They arranged themselves neatly on the desk's surface, as a ponderous stack of books floated into the room. Hermione could hear rustling from her bedroom.

"These on the bottom shelf?" Ron called.

"They're in the cabinet to the left. Under the file marker "Dumbledore", sub-tabbed …

"'G' for Goblin…" Ron chimed in. "You don't think I know your filing habits by now, Hermione?"

The question was good-natured enough in tone, but it snagged something in Hermione's thought process, as did her earlier surprise. She was continuing to attribute to Ron the attitudes and habits he'd had in school, and she supposed that was grossly unfair. He'd become almost unfailingly solicitous, nearly _too_ thoughtful, in fact. She thought she might rather enjoy a good row with him every now and then, but a lot of Ron's snap and zing had gone out of him since the Battle.

 _Shadows of who we used to be… ghosts…_ he'd said. She supposed that was true. They had become pale, translucent copies of the vibrant, full-color people they'd been once. She tried to shrug off the hovering aura of sorrow; there was work to do.

When Ron returned with the sheaf of parchments, Hermione was crouched over the desk, writing furiously. She had not even taken the time to sit down.

"She's got our names, and both code words. It's definitely from Luna," Hermione said, in the breathless tone she always used when in a rush to suss out something. Ron slid the chair over beneath her, and she sat down in it, without even looking. "Thanks."

"Anything else?" His voice held faint traces of amusement.

"What?" She flashed her eyes up at him for an instant, as she raked her hair out of her face, and resumed writing. Ron opened and closed his mouth a couple of times, clearly unsure how to proceed.

"It's…good to see you like this, Hermione. Almost like … almost like old times." He said the last phrase delicately, seemingly worried that he might unleash another Christmas-tree-type onslaught. Hermione set her quill down, and regarded him for a moment.

"I never thought I'd see the day that you would enjoy my being in one of my trademark free-for-alls." A smile glimmered briefly in her eyes, and then vanished. "But then, I never thought I'd see a lot of the things we've seen." She sighed, and picked up her quill again. "I'm sorry, Ron. I'm … I'm like a constant little grey rain cloud, aren't I?" There was a halfhearted laugh in her voice.

"Hey," Ron said softly, kneeling beside her. "Hey, it's not as if you don't – as if we all don't have reason." His voice twisted a little on the word 'all', as if belatedly realizing that such an encompassing word was hardly applicable anymore. He laid his big hand gently on top of hers. She squirmed in her chair when their skin made contact, and her hand trembled in the urge to snatch it away, but she forced herself to remain still.

"Ron – " The tone was a plea again. _Please don't ask this of me. Please don't force me to hurt you._ _Please don't destroy what little remains._

He hadn't let her articulate her protest last time, and he forestalled her once again. He zigzagged his thumb across the back of her hand once, squeezed her knuckles, and used his other hand to brace himself on the desk to rise. When he had stood to his feet, he moved toward the fireplace, leaning against the mantel with one hand, and gazing into the flames.

"I'm not – I'm not making a move, Hermione. I promise. But don't – "he stopped, sighing, and raked one hand through his hair, which was glinting burnished gold in the firelight. "Don't be so afraid of the other that you stop letting me be your friend."

She tucked her hair behind her ears, twisted it into a knot, and stuck her wand through it.

"Of course not, Ron," she said succinctly, though the matter of fact tone was tempered with tenderness.

There was silence. She sat motionless for a moment, her hands limp and still in her lap. There was so much to say; there was nothing to say. Ron seemed to want her; she wanted Harry. Their desires were incompatible with each other, and impossible in and of themselves. She found that she was pathetically grateful that Ron was at least attempting to be an adult about it.

"You've only got five hours and forty-five minutes left," he chided her gently, breaking into her reverie.

"Right," she breathed, shaking herself back to reality and flexing her fingers in preparation.

A moment later, the sounds of quill-scratch on parchment and the snap of flame were the only things to be heard in the tiny cabin.

* * *

"Ron! Ron, wake up!" Hermione shook his shoulder fiercely, her voice a hissing whisper, despite the fact that there was no one else around to disturb. Ron's lanky form was sprawled out on the worn sofa, head thrown back, where he'd fallen asleep waiting for Hermione to finish her translation. A Weasley family photo album was open across his lap. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, in rather dated hair and dress, were kissing behind a towering wedding cake that looked as if it were on the verge of collapsing entirely.

He startled awake, arms and legs pin wheeling, groping in his pocket for his wand. The album fell to the floor with a thump, closing of its own accord.

"What? What's going -?" He came more fully awake, and relaxed when he saw her. "Oh, you've finished then?" She waited for the second realization to come, that if she'd finished, and was waking him in the middle of the night, then something was up. And it probably was not good. "What does it say?" His face was guarded, his voice fearful.

"They've arrested Ginny."

"Arrested –? Then why isn't she here? Why didn't she let us know? Isn't that what her necklace was bloody well for?"

Hermione's expression was pure chagrin.

"Luna says that they've developed some kind of Nullification Charm for portkeys. The detention area is covered with them, so any portkey we'd have sent her wouldn't have worked. Ginny managed to get the pendant to Luna somehow, before she was taken down there."

"But - but Ginny's done nothing. _You_ said – "he stopped, clearly trying to gather himself, and remove the accusatory tone from his voice. "You said they wouldn't bother with her, that they'd only question her…"

"Luna says they gave her Veritaserum, and there was a question – Luna doesn't say what – that Ginny refused to answer. It was the Corklehaven Strain – from trying to overpower the Veritaserum."

"She muted herself?" Ron was aghast. The Corklehaven Strain was a documented wizarding phenomenon of a sort of magical implosion. In fighting the urge to tell the truth, Ginny had literally rendered herself unable to speak. "When will it wear off?"

Hermione shrugged.

"There have been cases that lasted minutes and cases that lasted months. But in the meantime…"

"They've got her for obstruction, don't they?" Ron finished for her.

"It sounds mostly trumped up, really only a technicality, but the legal procedure is sound. Luna says she contacted a cousin of the Patils, who's a solicitor, and sympathetic, but she's on the Continent right now. Something's wonky with her Muggle passport and the International Floo network, and… well, you can be assured _that_ isn't a coincidence. Luna says the appointed solicitor is supposed to be randomly selected, but she doubts that it's true in this case. She calls him a… " Hermione referenced her parchment, a mass of scrawls, spell deletions, crossed lines, and arrows pointing to corrected translations. "'A piece of Nargle-ridden dung from a flatulent Skrewt', and says that he is undoubtedly in Malfoy's pocket."

"What will they do?" Ron was speaking carefully, clearly trying to hang onto his control by tenterhooks. His hands were jammed into his pockets, as he paced the length and breadth of the small room.

"Probably try to fast-track a trial. Get her sentenced before Luna's friend can make it back into the country."

"But it – it's at least a minor offense, isn't it? It couldn't be – wouldn't be long…"

"Luna says that Malfoy's upgraded anything dealing with subversive activities or harboring fugitives to automatic Azkaban time."

" _Azkaban!?_ " Ron lunged for the battered cabinet above the sink, retrieved the small wooden chest there, and began to mutter the series of spells required to unlock it.

"Ron, what are you doing? _Ron!_ " Hermione dove after him, grabbing at his wrists, shouting over his attempts to hear himself speak, and trying to wrest the box from his grasp.

"I need the Floo Powder, Hermione," he growled, prying her fingers off of him, twisting to block her from the chest with his body.

"You aren't going anywhere!"

"I'm going to get my sister!"

"That's ridiculous, Ron. If you go to the Ministry, wand blazing, you'll end up in Azkaban as well. We need a plan."

Ron stopped struggling instantly at this unexpected acquiescence.

"I thought – I thought you'd –"he spluttered. Hermione slanted a dirty look at him, reset the spell-locks on the chest, and carefully replaced it in its cabinet.

"I know exactly what you thought." She strode back into the main body of the living area, pausing to pick up her translation of Luna's missive, half-crushed where she had dropped it and stepped on it, in her mad dash to stop Ron's half-cocked flight attempt. Ron followed her, his slumped posture and sheepish expression doing more to convince her that he was sorry than any actual words could. "Now, would you like to _listen_ to the rest of Luna's letter?" Her voice was syrupy and over-enunciated. Ron's ears were radiant, as he mumbled an obvious assent.

She settled back into the desk chair, and cast a Restoring Charm on the parchment. There was a soft crinkle as it smoothed itself back out.

"Now, Luna says that we can't get into the Ministry using any of the, er… traditional covert methods. They've got a Cascade now, like the waterfall at Gringotts, to remove any enchantments, Glamours, or effects of ingested potions. They're also in the process of putting in Magical detectors, to flag any and all magical output – she says this is mainly to prevent or detect any illicit activity after-hours. Anti-Apparation wards are up, the Fireplaces are under surveillance, and Portkeys can be tracked."

"So how can we even hope to get in?"

"Luna says that she's been working on using Shielding Charms, within the Ministry itself."

"How would Shielding Charms help us unless we're already under attack?"

"Not for Shielding a _person_ , Ron. She's talking about Shielding a _location_. Like the vent that leads down from the roof to … well, anywhere in the building you'd take a fancy to go. And if it's during regular Ministry hours, we'll be freer to move around, since the magical detectors couldn't possibly differentiate our magic from the magic of the Ministry employees. But Luna says that – for Merlin's sake, Ron, _what_ are you doing?"

Ron arrested his motion, half off of the sofa, as if he were ready to head to the Ministry then and there.

"Luna is still _testing_ these shields. We're not going to be able to rescue Ginny tonight." Apology flashed in her warm eyes, but she sat quite still, looking like Serenity personified in the desk chair, ankles crossed, hands daintily folded.

Ron let himself drop back onto the sagging sofa cushions. His eyes were snapping protest and his hair glowed vividly in the firelight. He was motionless, and yet managed to look like a mass of kinetic energy only momentarily suspended. Mrs. Weasley had once remarked that it was only Ron's skin that seemed to keep him from flying in all directions at once when he was younger. As he grew up, age had tempered this – age, and the somewhat more moderating influences of Harry and Hermione.

"When?" he ground out with some effort.

"I think we should use brooms," was the next surprising thing she said. "To get to the roof, I mean. Luna says the patrols are light, and she can tell us their configurations. We'll need schematics of the ventilation system, so we'll know how to get down to the dungeons, and – " She broke off at Ron's long-suffering look and raised eyebrows of inquiry, remembering his original question. "Luna says two weeks, at the most."

* * *

It took Luna half that time to send them another message that everything was in readiness, and so it was eight days later that Hermione found herself beneath the invisibility cloak with Ron in a deserted side corridor of the lower detention level. It was dank and dim, with a vague moldish smell, and Everlight torches glimmered serenely on the walls. Ron was bent nearly double, and could not have been comfortable, but Hermione was having a rather more unexpected problem.

The bloody cloak smelled like him. She would not have thought that smell could so infuse a fabric, but the gossamer veil brought him to her mind so sharply that it was painful. It was Harry's distinctive scent, a sort of outdoorsy, evergreen kind of smell, like Quidditch and sunshine and forests. Tears were pricking the backs of her eyelids, and she swore under her breath, forcing herself to focus on the situation at hand.

"Where the hell is she?" She voiced her frustration in the only way available to her, as she breathed in sharply through both nostrils and closed her eyes. _Harry, Harry, Harry…._

Even as she spoke, they both heard light footfalls from the main corridor, growing louder. A moment later, a stranger with honey-gold curls and a figure far more voluptuous than Luna's waif-like form drifted into view at the junction, her face mostly eclipsed by a large pair of Spectrespecs. Moving in a distinctively absent-minded way that could only be polyjuiced Luna, she fluttered her fingers at them, without raising her arm, and then flashed a deliberate five fingers, before continuing on in the direction she'd been headed. Hermione glimpsed her removing the bizarre eyewear, as she passed out of sight.

"Five minutes to get rid of the guard," Hermione muttered. Ron snorted a little, mocking her compulsion to explain everything, even the obvious. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, as tense as a wire. Hermione rubbed sweaty fingers against sweatier palms, as she rotated her wrist to look at her watch. She felt a tension headache strengthening its grip around her temples; it had begun as she tried to tamp down her terror on the broom ride to the Ministry roof, and was intensifying as she contemplated their precarious situation.

It was make or break, do or die. They would free Ginny or all end up in Azkaban.

 _We might as well have died on that battlefield with everyone else._

 _I sometimes wish I had._

Five seconds before Luna's time limit expired, Hermione tugged gently on Ron's sleeve, and they crept into motion. The main corridor was empty (Hermione knew that the main guard station was farther down, by the lifts), and largely unremarkable, save for an open door marked "Maintenance" some distance away. Hermione caught a flash of Luna and a scarlet-robed guard twined in an embrace before the door was shut decisively.

"Is she going to – ?" Ron asked. He had seen it too. Something inside Hermione broke a little.

"She is one of the most selfless people I've ever known," she murmured softly. Ron stared at the closed door, appearing somewhat stricken, but recovered himself as they reached the door to Ginny's cell.

It was made of heavy wood, windowless and imposing. There was no knob or handle. To the right of the door was a small placard reading simply, "4", and an unmarked slot just beneath it. Hermione cast her eyes toward the floor, and Luna had not disappointed. The guard's wand had rolled up against the wall, in the shadowy place beneath one of the torch sconces. She bent down to retrieve it - an onlooker would have seen the wand lurch upwards and vanish – and inserted it into the slot. There was an almost immediate chirp, followed by the clank of _Alohomora_ 'd locks and latches.

Hermione felt Ron let out a gusty sigh of relief, as she pushed open the door, and stepped out from under the cloak.

"Ginny, come on. There's not much time."

Ginny was sleeping on the unappealing looking camp bed, curled onto her side like a little child. Her vivid hair seemed to be the only splash of color in the cell, and it fanned out across her limp pillow and dangled off the edge of the mattress. She opened her eyes immediately at Hermione's voice, with no reaction of surprise, but merely arose, all business, shoving her feet into her shoes, and grabbing the work robes that draped over the cell's lone chair.

As she took in the noticeable relief on Ron's and Hermione's faces, a real smile flickered briefly across her face and then vanished.

 _I knew you'd come_ , she mouthed, still rendered speechless by her ordeal with the Veritaserum. _Thank you._

"We haven't done anything yet," Ron remarked dourly, keeping watch through the open doorway into the deserted corridor. He Disillusioned himself, fading from sight from the crown of his head downward, until he looked like nothing more than a quivering mass of twisted air and shadow. Hermione furled the invisibility cloak out at the corners, and threw it over her and Ginny's head.

"Follow me," Hermione hissed to Ginny in the barest of whispers. "We'll be headed to the roof through the ventilation network, and then we've got br—"

Her voice died in her throat and her blood iced in her veins. As Ginny crossed the threshold of the cell, an unearthly wail arose, undulating and horrific, until Hermione wanted nothing more than shrink down to the floor, hands clamped over ears, until it ceased; she could see it was affecting Ginny similarly. The torches changed color, blinked orange once, and then settled into a lurid and foreboding red.

Ginny grabbed Hermione's arm, her eyes wide and fearful, the question clear in her penetrating gaze. _What's going on?_

"They know there's been a breach. But we checked! We detected no wards up around the cell itself. The air shafts bypass the general wards of the building!"

"Obviously Lucius Malfoy has some innovative goons working for him. Who knew?" Ron muttered sarcastically. "I suggest we get out of here before the company arrives."

Now heedless of anyone who might be watching, they ran, the invisibility cloak streaming out behind the girls like a splendid banner in the wind. The lower parts of their legs periodically became visible, just as quickly winking out again. They careened around the corner into the smaller corridor where they'd waited, and Ron yanked the grate from the wall with a sharp, panicked flourish of his wand. What would have seemed like a deafeningly loud clatter onto the floor was hidden beneath a sudden noise of voices and rush of feet.

Ginny and Hermione clambered into the vent, situated low to the ground and in the far corner, and Ron had only just pulled the entirety of his lanky form inside and Summoned the grate, when their pursuers appeared, storming past the junction towards Ginny's cell, wands at the ready.

The grate clicked into place softly, and for an instant, nobody dared to breathe

"Let's go," Hermione mouthed. "We need to be a couple of floors up before they start sending out Detection Charms."

Neither of the Weasleys had to be told twice. Trying to move as quietly as possible, they crawled and slid and clambered through untold meters of ductwork, finally arriving at the hooded cover on the roof. Hermione thrust her head through the opening first, and, when all she saw was a deserted rooftop, she let herself breathe, feeling the steel band around her head ease somewhat, as the roaring in her ears abated.

Each of them _Accio_ ed a broomstick, and they were airborne almost before they were fully out of the vent onto the rooftop. Over her shoulder, Hermione heard a musical laugh – odd, she thought, that Corklehaven did not hinder all vocalizations – and she turned hesitantly to see Ginny looking utterly enraptured to be in the air on a broom. Hermione felt herself uplift, start hoping again… _they had done it!_

And just as quickly, Ginny's euphoric look vanished, as fear took its place.

Incredibly quickly – so quickly that Hermione could hardly make sense of it – they were practically surrounded by black-cloaked figures, also on broomstick. More surged from where they'd been hiding, hovering, waiting, just below the roofline of the Ministry, out of sight.

The three Gryffindors frantically tried to maneuver, but Hermione was out of her element, and it seemed like it did not take the pursuers long to realize it. Their spiraling flight closed in – Hermione could make out the Auror crests on the breasts of their robes – and she realized that they were being _herded._

 _They're keeping us beneath the Ministry umbrella so we can't Apparate!_ Some wandfire had been exchanged, but the feints and constant motion had added an extra layer of difficulty. Ron managed to wing one, and Hermione hexed another in the face, forcing the injured Aurors – one blinded, one wandless – to peel away from the others, and return to the Ministry.

Suddenly there was a rush of fiery air, a crackle, and Ginny went rigid, as though she had been stabbed between the shoulder blades. Her lips were pulled back in a rictus, as though she'd been caught in the exact instant before she screamed. Hermione's wand rapidly changed direction, but Ginny had already tilted sideways off her broom. She was limp, plunging toward certain death with frightening speed.

" _Arresto –_ " Grief tore at Hermione's throat and made her voice crack, but it wouldn't have mattered anyway. The last thing she saw was Ginny's flaming hair streaming upward, before it was extinguished in a cloudbank.

She looked frantically for Ron, and saw him, angled into a steep dive, already several hundred meters away, going after his sister. He'd made it through the hole left by the Aurors they'd wounded, and there were startled cries of protest, orders barked; three of the remaining guard broke away to pursue him. Hermione told herself that it was the frigid air causing her eyes to stream water. Her blurred vision did not create havoc with her aim, and this time she caught one of the pursuers right in the chest. He let out a muffled cry before toppling backwards off his broom.

She broke into an evasive pattern that they'd trained with during the last year before the Final Battle, but Hermione knew that her feints were too slow, her hands too tentative, causing the broom to be sluggish in response. _Where was Ron? Had Ginny survived?_ She let a stream of rapid-fire curses fly in one direction as she darted in another, hoping to throw them off. It seemed like an eternity, when Hermione knew it had been only seconds. She also knew that unless she could get through the Anti-Apparation wards, she had no hope of eluding all of the Aurors.

Her broom lurched and wobbled suddenly, as though someone had jumped down onto the bundle of straw, and Hermione felt herself lose control. Paranoid that perhaps she did somehow have a passenger on her broom, she tossed a look over her shoulder, only to see that her broom was, in fact, ablaze. It faltered, wobbled, and began to slow. The three remaining wizards were almost upon her.

Still hanging onto her damaged broom for dear life, she managed to douse most of the fire. The device simply would no longer obey her guiding hands, and the next several curses she fired missed widely.

Her broom's treacherous behavior saved her from being hexed outright, but the lead Auror was obviously getting impatient at his team's inability to get off an accurate shot. He flew perilously close to her, and darted out one hand to grab her wrist. She let out a startled cry, and flailed wildly, sparks spewing from her wandtip. Her broom moaned in protest, and Hermione felt the wood splinter. It gave one last might heave – a death throe – and bucked her off. A Stunner must have grazed the top of her head at the moment of her fall, for she became suddenly groggy and thick-headed, having to force herself to stay conscious.

Panic worked like a dash of cold water, even as it seized her by the throat, gripping her so fiercely with its talons that she thought it might suffocate her. Yet she managed to scream, and the high shriek spiraled away above her as she succumbed to gravity's inexorable pull. There were still hands, wrenching and wresting at her, merciless fingers plucking at her wand. Her fall had toppled the Auror as well. _He must have lost his wand,_ she thought distantly _. I'll be damned if I let him have mine._ She wondered futilely what had happened to Ron and Ginny. Strangely, the scene replaying itself in the forefront of her mind was one that was more than a year gone: Harry, the blazing look in his eyes extinguished, as he collapsed like a marionette with cut strings.

Her fingers were slipping on the wood, but she managed to shout, " _Expelliarmus!_ " The Auror ricocheted away from her in a graceful arc, and Hermione felt her mind clear further still.

Still the world spun up at her with dizzying speed, and she misjudged the distance of the winding grey-brown snake that was a river, wending its way through an industrial section on the outskirts of a city. She had no time to figure out which city, time enough only to shout a frenzied, _Arresto Momentum!_ , before she plunged beneath its surface.

She penetrated deeper than she'd thought, must have been going faster than she realized, and when she emerged, it was with much floundering, noisy splashing, and great draughts of oxygen. Her clothing dragged at her limbs, and she shrugged off her robes, shivering and gasping, as she made for a rickety dock at the shoreline.

She pulled herself out of the water with much effort, struggling for a few desperate seconds to focus, turning her eyes hopefully up and down the nearby shoreline. She had no idea where she'd fallen or when she'd crossed the wards, but she wished with all her might that she would see Ron and Ginny dragging themselves to dry land as well.

 _No_ , she thought, _they'd have Apparated away. If they made it, they'll go back to the cabin – Ron will take Ginny back to the cabin._ At any rate, she couldn't stay here; Aurors would be following her down the same way they followed Ron. Even as she became conscious of this fact, she thought she spied a few dark specks appear in the sky above, growing ever larger. Her time was up.

 _Harry fell; Ginny fell; Ron… oh God, what was all this_ for _?_ Despair was a knot in her gut, a clog in her throat, burning eyes, burning nose, fingernails digging fiercely into palms. _Don't leave me alone!_

She closed her eyes and concentrated on the tiny cabin far away in that smothering forest; with a small crack, like a snapped twig, she was in the tiny living room, a banked fire still glowing in the hearth, even though it felt like they'd left a lifetime ago.

There was no relief, merely an aching emptiness that threatened to consume her completely. Hermione sank to her knees on the hearthrug, and shrank to the floor, heedless of her sodden clothes pooling water on the floor, of the shivers that were violent enough to nearly be spasms. She lay there, curled up like a frightened child, and waited for the Weasleys to come.


	6. Chapter 6

_**Shadow Walker**_

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **-Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

* * *

 _ **Every word you spoke and everything you said, everything you left me rambles in my head.**_

 _ **-The Killers, "Goodnight, Travel Well"**_

The sheer concussive force of the explosion flung Hermione to the ground, but she did not cry out when the jagged fingers of a broken tree branch clawed at her face. She scrambled back to her feet, dusted her hands off on the seat of her jeans, touched the bloody laceration lightly, and hissed. A high-pitched whine rang in her ears, and she shook her head as if to clear out the noise. She turned back toward the forest, and looked dispassionately toward the ballooning pillar of smoke and the rapidly expanding inferno.

There was a strange glint in her eyes, as the corners of her lips up-tilted. She kissed her bloody fingers toward the blaze, wondering how many of them she'd killed, hoping that it was the entire patrol.

 _You don't know who they were. There could have been people like Luna, like Parvati… people with families and small childr –_ Hermione squelched the voice fiercely. _They were looking for me. They traced me back to this place. If they could have found me, they would have brought me in to Malfoy – or killed me; the outcomes are the same either way._

 _These people killed Neville, killed Ginny, killed Ron. They don't deserve my mercy._

Malfoy's henchmen had tracked her as far as the forest, but had found themselves unable to breach her wards. The forest was kept under constant watchful eyes, and while there were other avenues of escape Hermione could have explored, she chose instead the risky maneuver of dropping her wards, and waiting until they were upon her, before she blew up the cabin… with her pursuers inside. It had been as simple as a highly flammable potion used as an accelerant and an _Incendio_ spell. Hermione had glimpsed Draco Malfoy's distinctively white-blond hair at the front of the Auror column, and had felt a ferocious satisfaction welling up inside her.

 _Good,_ she'd thought. _Good enough, Lucius. I hope you hurt like I've hurt. I hope everyone you've ever cared about dies… Assuming you_ can _care about anybody at all._

She knew it wouldn't be long before another squad arrived to check things out, knew the alarms would sound when the Stealth Owl never arrived with the younger Malfoy's report of Hermione's capture. She took a few precious seconds to Glamour her appearance, as she watched the forest be consumed like so much tinder. The Water Extraction spells she'd performed ahead of time were doing their job; everything was going up that much faster.

 _Harry,_ that other voice whimpered, very quietly. _Oh, Harry, look what I've done. I miss you so much._

She Apparated to Godric's Hollow, and, deliberately chose a path that took her by the dilapidated remnants of the Potter house, though she would not look at it with anything other than her peripheral vision. Somehow, that house seemed to symbolize the sheer massiveness of everything she'd lost. And even though the day was warm, Hermione could almost smell snow in the air, feel her cheeks chapped with cold, feel her hand snugly in Harry's, as it had been that night where she visited his parents' graves with him. She walked unhesitatingly to the pair of marble stones labeled _James Potter_ and _Lily Evans Potter_ , and knelt before them. A waist-high obsidian obelisk was nearby – not Harry's actual grave, not the ostentatious marble display commissioned by the Ministry, but merely a memorial that she, Ginny, and Ron had had erected – but she could not look at it, not just yet.

"I'm sorry," she said aloud, but her voice was wobbly and broken _,_ cracking between syllables. "I'm sorry that I could not save your son." It had been some time since she had visited, but she always felt compelled to apologize; she could not have explained exactly why. She shuffled on her knees, less than a meter away, and looked at Harry's marker. _In Memory of Harry James Potter, 30 June 2001, "A three-fold cord is not quickly broken."_

"Harry, I'm sorry." It seemed like apologies were all she had left. She had not saved anyone; she had not changed anything. "They're gone; everyone's gone – and I – I guess I really am a criminal now. I don't want to leave you… but there's nowhere left to go. My mum and dad will..." Her voice faded into a sob, and there was silence, save the wind in the tree tops. She reached out to caress the face of the marker with the tips of her fingers. "I love you."

She closed her eyes for a moment, as the slight breeze wafted forlornly through her hair, imagining that it was Harry touching her hand, her face, Harry's warm breath in her ear, promising _someday_ without speaking a word. The ache in her throat grew to an almost unbearable pressure, and she wondered if anything would ever assuage the painful emptiness.

Finally, she leaned around at a slight angle, her hand resting against the top of the stone for support, to look at the side of the marker. Unobtrusively, beginning at the lower third of the obelisk, were two more names, finely –though hastily – etched by her own vine wood wand. _Ron Weasley, Ginny Weasley, 26/4/02._ And then, below that, more deeply inscribed, but nearly illegible, obviously driven by raw emotion were the words _I'll Never Forget_. She had no way of knowing whether the last Weasleys had lived beyond that fateful flight from the Ministry, but they had not been heard from or seen since, and even Luna at her most … persuasive… had been able to unearth nothing.

It seemed to Hermione that the searing acid of longing and loneliness surged through her with every pulse of her heart, and sometimes she wondered why it continued to function. _It would be so much easier_ , she reflected, _if the damned organ would just stop beating_. She thought of just collapsing here, in the shadow of those who had loved Harry the most; she imagined lying insensate as the grass ruffled around her and her eyes sightlessly reflected the sky. She wished for it in the same manner that one might wish to win the lottery, when one has never purchased a ticket.

She couldn't imagine actively doing something to cause her own death. For one thing, it would please Lucius Malfoy to no end. And then there was Harry… his imagined reproach pierced through to the very center of her. Those eyes…telling her that everything they'd endured had been for nothing, that he'd died for nothing, that they'd all died for nothing… No, she had to take up the flag of their cause and continue the fight, for as long as it took, even if she was the only one left, even if the only thing she could do was spit in the faces of those who told her she was one of the _untermenschen_ , and defy them by simply continuing to exist.

Slowly, she got to her feet, feeling as though she'd aged years in the small span of time she'd been kneeling. She kept one hand on Harry's marker for as long as she could, grazing it with her fingertips as she backed away, feeling bereft as the contact was broken. She took a deep breath, as if steeling herself for an unpleasant task, and then Apparated away with a small crack, not even taking the time to lower her outstretched arm.

Hermione reappeared in a narrow cobblestoned alleyway between two nicely kept houses. Neither had windows facing the alley, and Hermione was confident that she had not been seen, as she pushed open the small white gate and entered the back garden. The back door was locked, so she rapped three times and waited, fingering her wand lightly where it rested up her sleeve.

Just as she was beginning to wonder if anyone was home, there was a rustle, the click of the bolt being turned back, and the rattle of the door handle being turned.

"Mum!" Hermione said joyfully, and threw herself into her mother's arms, almost before the door was fully opened. Mrs. Granger held herself stiffly, startled by the fervent embrace by an apparent stranger, before finally wrapping her own arms around her daughter.

"Hermione? This is a surprise. It's been so long. Why –?"

"I know, Mum. It's been too long. I – there's so much I need to tell you. So many things – " Her mother's comforting hands were stroking her hair.

"You've changed, Hermione …"

"The Wizarding world is not—it's not the way it used to be. I have to be careful, Mum. There are people… looking for me." Hermione did another visual sweep of the garden, before closing and re-locking the door. "Where's Dad?"

"At the office," her mother replied, moving into the kitchen. "Would you like some tea?"

"Yes, thank you. Why did he go in on a Saturday?"

"He had an emergency." Hermione waited for more details, but none were forthcoming. There was a soft clink of china, as two cups were set on the table. Something prickled on the back of Hermione's neck, and she swiveled in the chair to look down the empty, dim hallway. She turned back, feeling even more foolish with her mother's mild gaze on her. "Is something wrong, dear?"

"Everything's wrong, Mum." She struggled to keep her chin from wobbling as she spoke. "You know about – about Harry. I don't even know what happened to Ron and Ginny … and I – the Ministry wants to arrest me, and – "

"Well, you're here now. And your father will be so glad to have you home!" Hermione blinked at her mother's lack of reaction to the news about Ron and Ginny.

"Mum, I just wanted to see you one more time, to tell you I was okay. I can't stay." Her tone was one of stating the patently obvious, even though she'd only just realized that it was true. Her intentions had been nebulous when she Apparated to her childhood home; even so, whatever she had been hoping would happen was clearly a non-issue. The chasm between her and her parents was vast; turning her back on the Wizarding world would be turning her back on Harry. She could _not_ do it. "They probably watch this place from time to time, hoping I'll come here. And after what I did today…" Curiously, her mother showed no interest in details, no maternal trepidation over what was worrying Hermione so.

"You can at least wait until your father gets home. He'd want to see you. I'm sure that it'd be safe that long, at least."

"I – I can't, Mum." Hermione couldn't keep the hesitant note out of her voice. How nice it would be to go to her room and burrow into her coverlet, surrounded by her old books and childhood things, knowing that her parents were there, and nothing could harm her. _If only that were true._ But there was no longer shelter or solace in this place. Hermione wasn't sure she'd be able to find it anywhere.

"Until your father gets home, Hermione. Then, you may go, if you must." Her mother's voice had a hint of iron in it, and it surprised Hermione once more. It had been quite a long time since she had been spoken to like that. "Drink your tea."

Hermione raised the cup to her lips, her feelings of unease a tightening knot in her stomach. The house seemed oppressively shadowy; its stillness foreboding rather than soothing. All the drapes were drawn, yet she could not shake the feeling of being watched.

She stopped, with her lips touching the rim of the cup, wondering at the unfamiliar smell of the tea.

"Is this a new blend, Mum?"

"Why – why yes, it is." Her mother stumbled over the reply, and Hermione replaced the cup in the saucer with a decisive noise.

"Mum, has anyone – " And then she heard it: the scuff of shoe sole against carpet, so softly that she might have missed it altogether. Without hesitation, she flung herself sideways out of her chair, hitting the ground and rolling, wand at the ready. A spell had barely missed her head, and taken out a cabinet or two, judging from the noise of splintering wood.

" _Expelliarmus!_ "

" _Protego!"_

"Dad?" Hermione said stupidly, staring at her father, armed with a wand of all things. She had to dodge another hex before she could say anything else, diving for what cover she could near the refrigerator. The realizations were almost immediate and very nearly crippling. "You're not my father!"

"They did say you were the brightest witch in your year." It was not her father's voice. She fired blind, and heard him swear, as the Stinging Hex narrowly missed him.

"What have you done with him?" Her voice was almost unintelligible with rage and terror.

"I assure you, he is quite beyond your concern." There was a sob from behind her, from her mother. Hermione looked at her, startled, having thought if one was a Polyjuiced impostor, then both must be. _Imperius,_ she realized, taking in her mother's motionless stance in the middle of a magical firefight. The moment of inattention cost her. " _Expelliarmus!"_ Her wand landed neatly inside the vase of flowers in the center of the kitchen table. " _Avello!_ "

The scream ripped from Hermione's throat, and she crumpled as the curse hit her. It felt like her skin was on the cusp of being forcibly separated from the sinew; it rippled and twisted, as if living things were writhing just beneath it. She realized she had fallen, when she felt her head smash against the Spanish tile; her sensory awareness was swamped beneath overwhelming pain.

" _Stop!"_ Her mother's tear-clogged scream met her ears, as if from a great distance. There were sounds of wooden chairs scraping the floor and toppling over, the noises of shattering glass. Her assailant was evidently trying to reassert the Imperius curse over her mother. Quietly, she rolled over, blinking furiously to remove the points of light from behind her eyes, and saw her wand lying in a puddle of water, leaves, and broken glass. Breathing heavily with effort, she retrieved it and pushed herself to her feet.

"Leave my mother alone! Your master's quarrel is with me. She's nothing to you!" The man-who-was-not-her-father was fending off her mother with one hand, brandishing his wand with the other. Mrs. Granger was fighting him wildly; Hermione could not get a clear shot.

" _Imperio!"_ He finally hit her, and her mother's features settled back into a placid mask. He flicked his wand in Hermione's direction. "Kill her."

Mrs. Granger moved toward back into the kitchen, removing a long knife from the block on the countertop with a metallic _shhiing_. Their attacker was flicking his wand back and forth, causing the older woman to walk in an odd pattern that kept her in – and him out of – Hermione's line of fire.

"M – mum?" Hermione could see tears streaming down her mother's cheeks, even though her eyes were impersonally cold. Hermione raised her wand, and it trembled so violently in her hand that she wasn't sure she could aim it with any kind of accuracy. " _Impedimenta!"_

Her mother was repelled violently in the opposite direction, as if shoved by rough, invisible hands. For a split second, her Polyjuiced father was distracted by the movement, and all Hermione needed was a quick Reductor at the ceiling.

There was a rumbling crash that quickly crescendoed to a roar, as the white plaster, followed by the attic flooring and stored items came raining down with an avalanche of force. White dust and insulation billowed forth, engulfing the room in a cloud and swallowing up their foe. For a long moment, there was utter silence. Hermione balanced on the balls of her feet, ready to move quickly should the fight commence again. She opened her mouth to speak, and was rewarded by choking powder, which coated her tongue and the inside of her mouth.

"Mu – Mum?" she said, in a dusty rasp. There was a moan in reply, followed by the rattle of sliding debris. "Mum, don't try to move. I'm coming." She slipped and slid across sawdust, random articles of clothing, and irregular slabs of drywall. Once she had moved closer, she could see the body of their assailant, already changed back into what she assumed was his proper form; his neck was bent at an unnatural angle and his gaze was directed over her head at nothing. She could muster up no emotion other than grim satisfaction.

Further towards the back of the room, she saw her mother, struggling to free herself from a pile of debris. Hermione was horrified to see that one of the ceiling beams had given way, and was crushing her mother's midsection. "Mum, please… try not to move."

"Your… your father – they – they killed him." Her breaths were coming in inadequate pants; her hands were scrabbling at the heavy wood with utter futility.

"I know, Mum. _Wingardium Leviosa._ " The beam lifted, moved aside. The pain-wracked look on her mother's face eased slightly, but her breathing wouldn't regulate. Hermione moved her hands over her mother, frantically at first, and then more mechanically, as the reality of the situation set in.

"He – he would never – he would never hurt me – or you, sweetheart."

"I – I know he wouldn't." The tears were scalding her eyes, her cheeks, dripping down her chin and onto her fingers. How much could one person cry? How much could one person bear? _Harry – Merlin help me, I'm not as strong as you._

"They did – they did something to my – to my mind. I – I tried to stop them – I wanted to warn you, but I – but I – "

"It's okay, Mum. I know you tried. It's okay."

"Are – are you in trouble, Hermione? Are they – are they going to come – come after you?"

"I can handle myself, Mum. Don't you worry about me."

"You're my little girl. Of – of course, I worry. 'Smy job." Her breathing became erratic, with heaving, convulsive inhalations. Hermione noticed that the pupils of her mother's eyes were different sizes. When she leaned over to check her mother's head, her palms came down in something sticky and dark.

"I love you, Mum," she managed to make herself say clearly. "I'm sorry I – I wasn't there more."

"You— you were doing something important. Your father and I – always knew you would do big things. We – we always knew…" She suddenly stiffened, her facial features tensing. Her hand clamped around Hermione's wrist. "You need to go."

"Mum, I can't leave you here. I – "

"Please – _please_ , Hermione. You _must s_ ave yourself. There's nothing – nothing you can do – for me. He says you need to go – _now_!"

Hermione stumbled to her feet, half-blinded and covered in dust. She tripped over a couple of smashed crates and nearly fell, a sobbed curse escaping her lips.

"Wh – who says, Mum? _Who?_ What are you talking about?"

"Why, Harry, dear. _Such_ a nice young man." Her mother's eyes were glassy and pain-dazed, with nothing of lucidity left in them, her voice slurred, yet her feeble hand-gesture made Hermione whirl, hoping against hope for some sight of him, even as she knew it was ridiculous. Her mother was dying, hallucinating; there was no rational reason she should –

Multiple cracks of Apparation, distant, yet all too close snapped her from her reverie. When she glanced back, she knew her mother was dead. She reeled from the realization, but felt no pain. The first hammer blow had fallen with Harry's death, had been fatal; these successive strikes were unnecessary, overkill, as she staggered around, careening from one tragedy to the next, stunned and senseless, while Fate waited for her to give up and stop moving.

 _Sorry, not today._ She maneuvered quickly around the rest of the mess, and slipped smoothly out of the kitchen door, breaking into a run once she cleared the steps. She vaulted the low stone wall separating their garden from the neighbor's, with one blood-smeared hand. She had just done so, when there was a surge of magic that rippled behind her, crackling at the ends of her hair. She had just barely made it outside the range of the Anti-Apparation wards. Before any Aurors could make it round the house, she Apparated away.

She had not consciously decided where to go, but found herself back at Godric's Hollow, near the wall enclosing the cemetery. The Potter house, she knew, was just out of side around a bend in the footpath. The little hamlet was quiet, even sleepy, and she had the sudden stabbing sensation of being the only person left on the planet. _If I just ceased to exist – right now – who is left that would even care?_ And her mother had seen _Harry…_ yearning sliced through her, as if death were a reunion among old friends, to which she had not been invited.

 _Hermione Granger, you are losing your mind._ Resolutely, she pushed thoughts of Harry, of her parents, of the Weasleys aside. She could not afford to let herself _feel_ anything; if she did, she knew that she would crumble to the ground like a discarded cloak. She needed a new place to hole up, a new way to remain in contact with Luna, a new method to disperse her insights, to remind people of the Boy Who Lived and Lucius' true allegiances.

She let her gaze drag itself up the path to where it disappeared around an outflung arm of forest, beyond which was situated Harry's childhood home. They had stayed there for awhile, the three of them, during a phase of the Horcrux hunt: cold, wet, frightened, and miserable. _The house was decrepit and leaky, which they tried to offset with a distracted Sealing Spell every now and then. Dumbledore was dead, the Ministry was less than accommodating, and Death Eaters had orders to lethally curse her and Ron on sight, and then escort Harry to his final destination. They had stumbled across a random patrol one evening, and it had turned into a brief skirmish. Clambering through the back door of Harry's erstwhile home, they had frantically erased all evidence of their presence, and hidden in the cellar. Hermione had Banished their research to a Muggle storage unit she had rented in her father's name for just this sort of eventuality, and they had crouched in the most shadowy corner, beneath the Invisibility Cloak, watching the half-flight of rickety stairs (the bottommost steps having crumbled into rotted splinters long before they arrived), and scarcely daring to breathe._

Hermione remembered how she had felt, with the dampness of the wall seeping through one side of her jumper, Ron all but sitting on her feet, and what seemed like blazing warmth, where Harry was pressed up against her on the other side. In the dark, she had groped for his hand, as Ron had reached for hers, and they had clung together, hoping that the imminent danger would pass them by. In the end, the Death Eaters had evidently been satisfied by the abandonment of the house, because they gave the utter darkness and broken stairs of the cellar only the most cursory of inspections. Thereafter, the Trio had blanketed the small town with layers of Detection Wards, and had slept beneath the Cloak each night, until moving on to their next Horcrux lead, two months later.

She cast a Disillusionment spell on herself before coming into view of the house, and hitched a jagged breath as she lifted her eyes and looked, _really looked,_ at the old building. She waited for the expected pain to throb through her, and then did a careful perimeter sweep before entering through an already broken window. She wanted to leave the rotten door intact, so as to draw no undue attention to her presence. It was empty, derelict, forsaken, as it had been when she stayed there with her boys; dust coated the floors, and cobwebs festooned the ceilings and corners. The house was empty, as it had been three years ago – nobody had known who cleared out the house following the occupants' deaths, and where the furnishings had gone.

Hermione was careful to erase her footprints, and to touch nothing, using her wand to stealthily open the cellar door. She would feel more at ease down there, where she could control access, where there were no windows at her back or unused rooms where assailants could lurk. She leapt lightly to the mucky cellar floor, and risked a little wandlight to look around. It was just as bare as the rest of the house; they had been painstaking in their efforts to leave no trace behind. Even so, Hermione almost thought she could see the three of them, as they had been: herself, hunched over a leatherbound book in the corner, charmed quill taking notes on a roll of parchment affixed to the wall; Ron, with Extendable Ear in place, monitoring his brothers' Wireless program, and other news reports; and Harry, poring over their Horcrux notes, looking pale and weary, flashing a strained smile at some humorous comment from Ron. She could almost hear Ron's laugh, and she shivered, the loneliness pressing down on her as though she were entombed.

 _Entombed…_ The oppressive darkness came roaring back with the force of a tsunami. _Mum, Dad, Harry, Ron, Ginny, MumDadHarryRonGinny …_ She had not gotten to say good-bye to any of them. She felt smothered, sluggish, spent, rent asunder; the weight of her isolation was crushing.

She eyed the door to the house, positioned high on the wall from where she stood, with trepidation. It was still too open, too assailable, not far enough in the bowels of the earth for someone Forgotten as she. She had made a circuit of the room, and was standing near a far wall, rolling her wand between two fingers, only half-listening to the _click, click, click_ it made against the damp brick.

The noise made her think of Diagon Alley, and that made her look at the dreary wall in a new and different light. _A new room, an invisible undetectable flat off the cellar… I would be hidden, I would be close to Harry, somewhere that once meant something to Harry…_

She traced the outline of the bricks into the vague shape of a doorway; the mortared lines glowed briefly as her wand touched them, and she was filled with an odd sort of melancholy joy, as she struggled to salvage the tattered remnants of what she had left.

 _Everything that's gone… everything I've got left… it's all the same._ Despite her earlier reluctance to even look at the house, it seemed appropriate somehow, to retreat here, in this place of Death, to mourn what was gone, what she would forever miss. And maybe, somehow, to fight those who had destroyed her life, to make those who had taken everything sorely regret the taking…

 _Harry, I'm here…_

 **TBC...**


	7. Chapter 7

_**Shadow Walker**_

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **-Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

* * *

 _ **A thousand other boys could never reach you. How could I have been the one?**_

 _ **-Goo Goo Dolls, "Black Balloon"**_

The gaily striped umbrellas shielding the outdoor seating from the overhead sun did not match Hermione's mood. _Maybe if they were gunmetal gray,_ she mused, _or some kind of sick, murky green._ She thumbed the strap of her handbag more securely onto her shoulder, as she threaded through the white tables, crowded with Muggles having lunch and taking advantage of the lovely weather.

Behind her sunglasses, she let her eyes roam over the scattered individuals who were sitting alone. Once, twice, three times… all the while, keeping her movements casual, in the effort to be just one of a herd, a nondescript young Englishwoman looking for somewhere to sit.

After the fourth time, she strolled over to a bench, her stride fluid and unconcerned, even as her insides coiled into knots. She unfolded a random daily paper – she had bought it at a stand two blocks back, without even looking at the masthead – and pretended to read it. Letters, words, sentences, paragraphs all swam before uncomprehending eyes. She uncrossed her legs, then recrossed them the other way.

She sat there for close to an hour before forcing herself to admit that Luna had not shown up.

They had been meeting covertly for over a year now: dates, times, and places that rotated in a system the two of them had gradually developed. They didn't always speak, and a few times, had not even seen one another… but the contact had always been made. Once, Luna had left her message in a discarded, half-finished crossword. Another time, Hermione had dropped hers in Luna's bag when they collided. _Oh, excuse me. I'm terribly sorry._ They had continued on in opposite directions.

They always met in Muggle London, and, if necessity required it, Hermione would sometimes sneak into the Ministry – using Luna's shields – for a little covert surveillance. Luna had never spoken of the guard stationed at Ginny's cell, but occasional comments led Hermione to believe that she was continuing such actions, at even higher, more influential levels. When Hermione had looked at her with concern, Luna had shrugged. _We all make our sacrifices, Hermione_. Her information had helped Hermione fill her underground newsletter, and a couple of times they had used it to sabotage a meeting or a public rally, forcing Lucius Malfoy's propaganda machines to cancel the gatherings.

Luna had never missed a meeting before. It had been a couple of weeks since Hermione had heard from her at all, though no contact was scheduled until today.

It was unusual. And unusual meant worrisome.

Hermione sighed. There was no point in continuing to sit here, when it was obvious that Luna was not coming. Perhaps she would send word later. She folded the paper and immediately forgot about it, running her eyes over the happy crowds of people, as she stood.

The sun was warm on the top of her head, and she looked at all of them – Muggles – chatting with friends, talking on phones, eating ice cream, and felt a sudden swamping longing to belong. There was a profound loneliness so cold and complete that she felt as if she surveyed the throngs from some high and icy spire, rather than standing among them. The ever-present shards of grief and pain pricked at her, as she moved, smooth and unobtrusive, to an isolated alcove and Apparated back to Godric's Hollow.

* * *

One week later, she was still feeling the vague sense of dread, wondering what had happened to Luna. Her heart was not in her task, as she jotted her thoughts on Malfoy's latest injunctions against the Muggle Born. Her knees were cramped under the rickety desk, and she turned in her chair to straighten out her legs and point her toes.

Her gaze drifted around the tiny, secret cellar room, taking in the sagging sofa upholstered in an indiscriminate bluish-grey, which she Widened and slept on at night, the twin bookcases, filled to overflowing, the pristine little potions lab in one corner, and the sad kitchenette that was just beyond her elbow. No windows, no human contact, no sense of belonging… it was – it was just a place to stay, she thought, something that kept the rain off, the cold out, and the bad people away. It wasn't home, and she was beginning to believe that she'd lost that place forever.

Absently, she picked up her quill and doodled in the margins of her parchment, any real desire to finish her memo flattened beyond repair. _What is even the point?_ She wondered disconsolately. _I'm a criminal, a Muggle-born terrorist, and everyone who ever really knew me is gone. There are some sympathetic to the cause, but so few are afraid to stand. At this point, I'm not sure a battalion would be enough, but I know I can't do it alone._

It had been quite some time since she had ventured out to the graveyard to visit Harry. She was fairly certain that it was being watched. Lucius had send Ministry goons out to sweep Godric's Hollow once or twice, to no avail – not only had they gained no hard evidence of her presence there, but she was pretty sure one of the wizards was still in St. Mungo's trying to relearn how to tie his shoes.

No Ministry representatives had been back. Hermione sighed, not feeling comforted. Lucius Malfoy was patient; she was alone; he probably thought he could wait her out. She had the sensation of treading water, knowing that she should either strike out for shore, or let herself drown… but somehow she could not bring herself to do either one. It would mean letting Harry down, betraying him, _abandoning_ him, and so she flailed rhythmically to no real purpose, and tried to keep her head above water.

A soft tone interrupted her melancholy musings, and her eyes flew swiftly to the parchment map Stuck to the opposite wall. It was a plan of the house, each room drawn to scale and the ward placements carefully marked.

A ward had been breached.

Her eyes flickered to her getaway bag, but she didn't move to begin filling it. She should have had some warning when a living being set foot across the perimeter of the property. An alarm should have sounded when any of the doors or windows had opened. It was as if the intruder had Apparated into the kitchen, but that should not have been possible. The person was alone, and was making no move to conceal his presence. Hermione had not credited the Ministry with much penchant for subtlety, but they were obviously trying out some new tactics.

It didn't matter, she decided. She could handle one lone Ministry stooge with her wand tied behind her back, and he had been there long enough.

Soundlessly she crept up the broken stairs, and eased into the living room, thankful that she kept the cellar door so well oiled. She crouched low to the floor near the farthest corner, and strained her eyes to see something besides utter blackness. The house was dark and completely silent; the silence seemed to be breathing, waiting… and then, she heard? – sensed? – something move from the kitchen, maybe the faintest whispery brushing of cloth against the edge of the door frame.

Not allowing herself to hesitate, she fired off a Stunning spell in the direction of that tiny sound. Splinters of wood erupted from the kitchen door, and she heard a hiss of startled air between clenched teeth. She balanced on the balls of her feet, ready to move at the slightest provocation, and allowed a small smile to play on her lips. He would be moving now, she knew, toward her or toward the nearest exit of the front door? She took a guess, and fired again, hoping she could see _something_ in the flash of light, but the spell was too quickly swallowed up in the fathomless black.

Her eyes were beginning to adjust, and she should have been able to see movement at least, but there was nothing save the faint gray light coming from the windows. Then, she heard a whispered word, too low for her to catch. She braced herself for an onslaught, but found herself choking on a cloud of noxious smoke instead. Her trespasser _was_ going for the front door, and attempting to mask his escape. Hermione supposed she could just let him go, but she wanted answers. She _needed_ to know how he'd breached her wards, how he'd managed to get inside with her being none the wiser.

As she heard the sudden crackle of electric current, and realized that he had touched the charged handle of the front door, the urge to cough became too great to quell.

" _Ven-tosus…_ " she managed to hack, and the spelled breeze wafted through the room to blow away the smoke. Hoping that his nerve endings had been sufficiently shocked so as to slow his retreat, she aimed _Expelliarmus_ and a Leg-Locker jinx at the place she knew he'd have to be standing. She was rewarded by the hollow wooden clatter of his wand rolling away and the heavier, more substantial thump of a body hitting the floor. Quietly, she crept to his side.

"Who the hell are you, and what are you doing here?" There was quiet anger in her voice.

"Oh God." The voice was wheezy; he'd had the wind knocked out of him when he fell. Her heart leaped into her throat when she heard it, and she squeaked out a gasp without really meaning to. Even as her head argued that it couldn't possibly be him, irrepressible hope surged up inside, hot and eager. _No, it's just someone who sounds a little like him, and you are finally_ truly _losing your mind._

" _Lumos!_ " she whispered harshly, lowering her wand so that he was nearly blinded by the bright light. He squinted away from it reflexively. She was almost trembling in her desire to see who had the voice of the Boy She Loved, to see in what other creative ways Fate could torture her. She saw the dark swatch of hair, the glint of metal frames on his face, the strong set of his jaw, and the lithe outline of his body.

The wild frisson of hope was quenched beneath a tidal wave of anger. It _did_ look like him, but _could not_ be him. Therefore, someone was tricking her, in order to trap her, and someone had put an unerring finger right on the cruelest way to do so.

She jammed her wand between his ribs rather harder than was strictly necessary.

"Who sent you here? Who are you?" She was so angry she could barely speak. _Harry!_

"It's me – it's Harry," he gasped, arching away from the insistent tip of her wand. He looked up at her then, and she had difficulty controlling the emotion that washed over her. His eyes – the expression – it even _looked_ like Harry. He was looking at her like Harry would have looked at her. Tears surged to her eyes, and she blinked them back with self-righteous fury.

" _Who sent you here?"_ She wanted to kill him, to hurt him for hurting her, for daring to sully the treasured image of Harry Potter, when he was not worthy to lace Harry's trainers.

"Nobody sent me." He was speaking quickly, evidently detecting her rapidly unraveling patience. "I came here on my own. I've been – "

"Harry's _dead._ " Oh, how it still hurt to say those words. "I'll ask one last time: _who are you?_ "

"I _am_ Harry Potter, just like I said." He raised his hands, as if to ward her off. His eyes were beseeching her. _Those green eyes…_ she swallowed with difficulty. "I'm just not from this universe."

Hermione let out a bitter half-laugh. Did he think her an utter fool? She rolled her eyes, and did not lower her wand.

"That's original, at least. Did the Ministry send you here?" She gritted her teeth so that her jaw would not tremble.

"The Ministry? _No!_ I'm telling you the truth. I'm from another universe." He certainly _looked_ sincere. His acting skills were prodigious indeed. "I'm looking for – for you…"His voice sounded wistful, hopeful, longing. Something uncomfortable churned up in her stomach. _A ruse, it's all an elaborate ruse._

"For me?" She jabbed him again with her wand, hoping she could sound properly skeptical, while drinking in the sight of him.

"I was in – we were fighting the Final Battle – against… Voldemort?" He said the name uncertainly, waiting for her to verify. Against her will, she nodded. "You were taken hostage, sent to another universe, stranded there. For five years, everyone thought you were dead. I've been looking for you – that is, my – my universe's you." His face crinkled up, as though he realized how ridiculous he sounded. "Does that – does that sound familiar at all?"

"I think I would remember being transported to another reality against my will. I _did_ fight in the Final Battle _two_ years ago. You – _Harry –_ " she caught herself quickly. _This is not Harry!_ "defeated Voldemort, but he was killed doing so. Nearly everyone was…" _Harry, Mum, Dad, Charlie, Neville, Ron, Ginny, Lavender… Luna?_ "I've been living in hell since then, but I suppose it's the hell I belong in." She shook off her reminiscences, and tried to focus on the task before her. "I doubt you could prove any of this to me. Why should I believe you?"

And then he said the _one_ thing that would slay her.

"Would Harry have ever lied to you…done anything to hurt you?" She felt frozen by the intensity of his gaze, like he knew what she was thinking. _Of course he wouldn't. He'd rather die than hurt me in any way._ The hope rekindled its little flame in her chest, and she almost smiled.

"No," she sighed. "He wouldn't have."

She wasn't at all sure where the truth lay, but she no longer truly believed it was his intent to harm her.

"Finite…" she took the Leg-Locker curse on him, and ordered him up. "We've been up here too long already."

She retrieved his wand and poked him in the back, directing him ahead of her toward the cellar door. She walked quietly, still wary for any sudden or unexpected moves.

"Do you… live here?" He asked, his voice sounding oddly disembodied in the dark.

The lonely despair surged back into the forefront of her brain, as she thought of her solitary existence in her tiny little windowless cell of a hideaway.

"I don't live anywhere." She could practically taste the bitterness of the words on her tongue. She nearly walked into his back, as he hesitated, and she almost chuckled when she realized that he was uncertain about grasping the door handle.

"Only the front door's rigged. Little concept I borrowed from the Weasley twins. I suppose you know them."

"Sure, I know Fred and George…" The ready acceptance in his voice, the easy way he spoke the twins' names stabbed at her. Obviously, he knew them well, and had seen them not long ago. Her very existence seemed to mock at her, laughing at the way she clung to the shredded fragments of what was left of her life.

She prodded him on down the stairs, and she could hear the hesitation in his footfalls, the careful way he placed each foot as he descending into even more complete blackness. She thought, _My God, the stairs!_ at almost the exact same time that she felt him waver, and she grabbed the back of his shirt collar to keep him from toppling to the cellar floor. She had forgotten all about the missing steps.

"The bottom four steps are gone. Sorry." She winced at how peremptory the words sounded, but she was hanging onto her emotional control by a thread. It was just _too hard_ having him here. She brushed by him in the dark, trying to ignore the way it felt to be so close to him, to feel him breathe, to feel his warmth. "I left it that way because it makes people think nobody's been down here in ages."

She jumped off the last stair, and her shoes made a scuffling sound on the mucky cellar floor. She moved to the wall with the hidden door, and began to tap out the coded pattern on the bricks. She pretended that she didn't care whether Harry followed her or not, but she still felt her heart accelerate when he landed lightly at the bottom of the stairs.

The bricks formed themselves into a small arched doorway, and she looked back at him briefly, nodding her head in the direction of the little apartment, not trusting herself to speak. He did a double take as the secret door disappeared once again after they'd entered, and she could see the flare of concern in his eyes as he surveyed her dreary little domicile. It seemed like he looked around for a long time, and she felt her defenses rise at the thought that he might be judging her, pitying her.

"Approve?" she asked, biting sarcasm in her tone. He must have been a thousand kilometers away, for he flinched at her voice.

"Hermione, why?" She bristled at the presumption in his voice. _You don't know me_ , _and I don't know you._ But her inward aching gave lie to her brave front. Her eye fell on her little potions lab, and she moved toward it with a purpose. At the very least, she could determine this. She ticked her finger down her alphabetized rack of potions, and withdrew a small vial of clear liquid.

"Drink this."

He looked almost offended, as his eyes flickered between her face and the vial she held.

"You're making me drink Veritaserum?"

"If you don't have anything to hide, then it won't matter, will it?" As she handed him the potion, she scanned him with her wand, setting his own wand down carefully on the back of the sofa. "No traces of polyjuice or recent Imperius activity."

He really almost seemed _hurt_ at her pointed lack of trust, but he poured the contents of the vial down his throat, without further protest. She saw him relax ever so slightly as the Veritaserum took hold in his system.

She began to fire questions at him in rapid sequence: first to satisfy her curiosity, then to trip him up, and then just because she wanted to hear his voice. For it _was_ him, she could no longer deny it. The inflections, the gestures, the body language were all Harry's. She was content to listen to him, to bask in his presence, hopefully without being terribly obvious about it.

She thought she was doing quite well, until he mentioned that he lived with Ron and Luna. Just the curve of his mouth as he spoke that one syllable of their best friend's name was enough to send a pang shooting through her like electric current.

"Do they – do they know you're – " Her voice cracked, as her throat closed up over her words. She swallowed forcefully to keep the sobs from bubbling up, and swiped at her tears with the back of her hand. " _Damn_ it."

"What's wrong?" His voice was warm and low with concern, concern for _her_.

"It's just – it's just been a long time since I've heard anyone say Ron's name. And – and Luna…" She sniffed again, blinking the tears away, and tried to sound more composed. "I last saw Luna three weeks ago. She wasn't at our usual meeting place last week." _She's probably dead too. Just like everyone else._ Hermione could not alter the morbid direction of her thoughts. She thought maybe she could understand where Harry's paranoia had come from: _everyone who loves me dies._

"So – so Ron – they're … gone…here…?" She watched the sadness flit across Harry's face as he contemplated the idea of Ron's death.

She nodded, irritated at her weepiness, and her mind cast about frantically for another question, any innocuous thing she could ask him.

Harry could obviously read her like a book.

"Don't you believe me yet?"

"You came – you came all this way to look for – for H – Hermione?" Her mouth tripped over the syllables of her own name. It seemed so odd to speak of herself in the third person.

"Yes." The reply was terse; his gaze had dropped to his hands, fidgety in his lap.

"Why?"

She knew the answer before she asked it, knew it like she knew what _her_ answer would have been, were the situation reversed. And it still shook her to her core, when he raised his eyes to meet hers. The brilliant green color fairly blazed with the intensity of his feelings for his Hermione. His gaze moved over her face, and she felt the heat of the look like she would feel his touch. She felt her face grow hot, and her knees wobbled. Without breaking eye contact with him, she groped for the back of the chair to hold herself up.

"Why do you think?" He asked, somewhat unnecessarily at this point. She clamped her hands around the back of the chair, feeling her fingernails bite into the lacquered wood, in the effort to keep herself from crossing the small space and flinging herself into his arms. Clinically, she took note of the oddness of being jealous of oneself.

"Well, she's very lucky." Her voice was light and artificial, and something flickered in Harry's face. She turned away from him, feeling somehow that she had hurt him, that she had belittled what he felt for this woman, when it was every bit as strong as what she felt for him. He must have seen some traces of her love in her face, for he blurted,

"Wait! Were you – were you and Harry – ?" He stumbled to an ungainly halt, and waited, appearing to hope she'd understood what he had not said.

" _Promise me…" Harry had said, whispering almost into her mouth, his lips barely skimming hers, still treading that fine line - two friends whispering, just two friends whispering together._

… _his eyes were distant, glassy, unresponsive._

 _There were clawed hands tearing at her chest. Her face was sticky, her nose was running, and yet she watched his face avidly._ _Be the Boy Who Lived, please, Harry_ _._

 _Another breath drawn in, shallower and slower, noisy but ineffective. His lips took on a bluish cast._

 _She could still feel the brush of his lips on her cheek, her ear, her mouth, could still feel the funny jump in her stomach when their hands touched._

She seemed to draw herself back from far away, as she shook her head at this interloper, this Other Harry.

"No," she said, realizing again how sadly true it was. They had had nothing but hope, nothing but the promise of _someday_ , that turned out to be an empty promise indeed. She said it again. "No, we – we never…I – I sometimes hoped that – but there wasn't any time, and he – you – he – then he – "

"Then he died," Harry interjected gently, as she visibly struggled. She closed her eyes, and nodded, feeling the old pain wash over her, the familiarity of it was almost like a long-lost friend. "Voldemort killed him?"

She told him what had happened in a wooden voice, brittle and unyielding around the words that had sculpted her agony, built her a castle in which to suffer. She had never told anyone her version of the story, and she found herself falteringly spilling the whole sorry tale, speaking as if she were speaking to _her_ Harry, and not this lookalike, who watched her as if he felt her pain.

"…you don't know what it feels like to see you again…"

Harry's eyes flashed, and she thought he might reach out and touch her.

"I do understand, more than you know." They looked at each other for a moment, and she remembered the reason he was here, that he was looking for Hermione. She read his loss clearly in his face, and knew that he _did_ understand.

And then he was asking questions about the cellar room, about the aftermath of the war, and some part of her relished the disbelieving horror on his face; some part of her was relieved that he still saw things the same way, that she was not the only one who knew that the order of things was _wrong_. Somehow it made her feel closer to this Harry, made her feel so much less alone. _Harry, if only you'd been_ here.

"Why don't you leave?"

Her neck muscles pulled taut, as she jerked her gaze up to his. Maybe she'd been wrong; maybe he didn't understand at all.

"Leave?"

"Leave!" he repeated, as if she spoke English poorly or something. He flung his arms outward in a frustrated gesture that took in her hideaway. She could see the protectiveness rising up in him, and longed to hide herself beneath that security. "Get out of this place. Go to America, go anywhere – anywhere but here."

She sighed, and sat down, her entire posture bespeaking defeat. He wasn't saying anything that she hadn't already said to herself, hadn't already argued endlessly over with herself.

"I feel closer to _him_ here."

"He's _gone_ , Hermione." The voice was oh-so-gentle, but Hermione flinched as if he'd slapped her. She couldn't bring herself to look at the tenderness she knew would be in his eyes. "He's gone, and he's not coming back. He wouldn't want to see you like this. He – it hurts _me_ to see you like this. If there really is no one left, nothing else that can be done, you ought to wash your hands of this affair and have a _life_ of your own, instead of – of mourning after ghosts."

His voice rekindled her ire, and she straightened, raking him with a regally fierce look. _How dare he lecture me on moving on with one's life?_

"As you've done?" She raised one skeptical eyebrow at him. "You've given yourself away by what you _haven't_ said. You were torn apart when she disappeared, weren't you? You've been drifting for five years, pretending to have a life, even _knowing_ she would have rather died that day than see you like this." He blanched under her assault, but she did not waver. "And now, you're grasping at the faintest threads of hope, on this wild goose chase to find her! Do you even have a plan? Do you even have a glimmer of a strategy? Or are you planning on drifting around different universes for the rest of your life, hoping you'll bump into her accidentally?"

She had spewed all this at him out of her knowledge of her Harry, and when she saw the angry flush stain his cheeks, she knew she'd guessed correctly.

"As a matter of fact, I _do_ have a plan," he informed her, sounding defensive and annoyed. She leaned forward, propping her chin on her hands, and looked at him expectantly. _Okay, let's hear it_ , her posture said.

"In the last universe I was in, I saw Sir Nicholas…"

 **Okay, I think we're getting into the part everyone was waiting for! I hope everyone enjoyed it, even though a lot of it was a rehash.**

 **You may leave a review on your way out if you like. It would be so, so much appreciated!**

 **-** _ **lorien**_


	8. Chapter 8

_**Shadow Walker**_

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **-Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

* * *

 _ **Just breathe the air inside, and bring on back that lonely smile.**_

 _ **-Feeder, "Forget About Tomorrow"**_

They had argued momentarily, voices rising, eyes flashing angrily. Hermione had retreated to the place she knew well, with lofty stance and clipped Prefect voice as firmly in place as if she had been at Hogwarts yesterday. She almost couldn't believe herself. He was here; Harry was _here._ And she had the temerity to snap at him? Instead, she should be…

And before she could even articulate to herself what she should be doing ( _kissing the hem of his robes? giving thanks to all that was holy for his presence?_ ), he leapt up from the sofa, as she'd begun moving away, and… he touched her. It was just a firm grip at her elbow, a plea for her attention, but when she turned to look at him again, it was as if electric current threaded through that contact.

Harry must have felt it too, for he all but shied away.

"I'm – I'm sorry." She wasn't sure either of them knew for what he was apologizing, but he added, "I – I should have – I should have known that you wouldn't do anything that you hadn't already sussed out ahead of time."

She could have acknowledged the compliment, this nod to her penchant for preparedness and contingency plans. Instead, they just looked at each other – although Hermione wasn't sure that it could be adequately described by a word as commonplace as _look_ , when it was something she was feeling clear down to her toes. She reflected on the utter strangeness of this entire encounter. It was Harry, and yet it wasn't. They'd known each other for ages, and yet they hadn't. His very presence brought to full living color both the most joyful and the most desolate memories she possessed. Tragedy seemed to flare to life in his eyes, and she also knew that – at least – he _did_ know exactly what she was thinking and feeling, understood the grievous blows that life had dealt her.

He was going through it too.

Hermione swallowed with difficulty, and tore her eyes away from his. She grasped for something clinical to talk about, and for a time, they were sidetracked with a more impersonal discussion about their plan, Luna, and Wizarding society under Malfoy.

Harry's obvious sympathy seemed to pierce through her very soul, to lay bare wounds that had never really healed. She recalled her feeling last week, standing in Muggle London, feeling untouchable, unreachable, utterly isolated.

"Sometimes I get so tired," she finished, in a small voice that did not sound like her at all. Seeing him here was just too hard. She dropped her gaze to her shoes and willed herself not to cry.

"Hey," he whispered softly, as tenderly as he would to a lover. He pulled at her arm again, and she let him. "Hey, Hermione…"

She raised her eyes toward him then, as his breath fanned her ear. _So close, two friends…just two friends…_ She wanted contact with him so badly. Her hands were raised to cup his face, before she even realized it, and she arrested the motion awkwardly.

"Merlin, I've missed you." Her voice was a shuddering understatement. There was longing in his eyes that mirrored the yearning that she also felt, and she watched them close slowly, as he inhaled a deep, slow breath, trying to bring himself under control.

She waited for his eyes to open again, regarding every feature, as if needing to memorize him. She could feel the radiant heat of his body next to hers, and felt herself suffused with it. The _want_ rose up, unquenchable, unfathomable, and she felt that she could easily drown in the intensity of it. Something matching glinted in his eyes, and she felt the jolt deep in the pit of her stomach.

Hermione was barely able to bite back a gasp, when his fingers touched her cheek, stroking down the line of her jaw. She struggled to hold herself together in this maelstrom.

"Hermione…" It was almost a groan, and reminded her – _so much –_ of that terrible Last Day, but when she looked at him once more, she knew that she could not deny herself this much, this once.

She had no sense of either of them moving, but then his lips were on hers, and it was… it was _everything._ She couldn't breathe; she never wanted to breathe again. Her senses spun awry, until they encompassed nothing but him. She wrapped her arms around his neck, and he gathered her closer, as if they could somehow become one with each other by proximity alone. She felt his kiss with every nerve ending of her body; it made her pulse race, her knees wobble, and her chest heave. She thought of that day in the Great Hall at Hogwarts, before they surged out to do battle.

 _It would have been like this._

The pain of loss, of now _knowing_ exactly what she had had torn away from her, poured over her afresh, like acid over a gaping wound.

At almost the same instant, he pulled away from her abruptly, recoiling from her to the opposite end of the sofa. Hermione's lips parted, as she felt the new sting of rejection, abandonment. She pulled in a jagged breath of air, and reeled under the weight of reality that had crashed back into her.

 _Stupid,_ she thought. _That was stupid. He is Harry, but he's not Harry. I can't ever wish that back._ And yet, if he'd said one entreating word, made one beckoning gesture, she would have been back in his arms with the speed of a snitch in flight.

Harry looked immeasurably guilty, even though he also seemed as shaken and affected by the kiss as Hermione was. _He feels as if he has betrayed_ her _._

"We can't –" He was having trouble forming words, struggling to regulate his breathing. "We can't do this. You're not – I – I'm not – "

 _But I am! We are!_ Hermione retreated behind her personal walls, built out of anguish and isolation, before she could do something embarrassing like beg. Stiffly, as though her bones were made of glass, she stood, Summoned a scroll from her desk, and resumed packing for their clandestine trip. _Careful,_ she told herself, _step, step, step, pick up the knapsack, open it, don't look at him… good girl._

"We should get going." She felt distant, almost out of body; her mouth was moving, but she could make no sense of the words that were coming out. "We'll need to be out of there, before the first Unspeakables arrive at dawn."

"Hermione…" He said her name, and it was no longer a plea laced with desire, but an entreaty for understanding. She knew what he was not saying: she was _not_ the one he was looking for. She knew it, but she did not want to hear it from him. _The ultimate rejection… from all I have left._ The pain of it was as a sledgehammer blow to her chest, and it was all she could do not to double over from the force of the heaving sobs that threatened.

" _Don't!_ " she ordered sharply, as the knot in her throat tightened further still. If she actually had to hear him say the words …

She felt, rather than heard, him make a movement, which he immediately checked. She couldn't look at him. Then, very softly, a whispered and broken,

"I'm sorry," as if he truly realized the inadequacy of those words. She immediately felt like a beast. None of what had happened to her was _his_ fault, after all.

"You've nothing to be sorry for," she replied truthfully, and turned to concentrate on the knapsack she was still clutching, forcing herself to focus on the task at hand. This Harry at least needed her; she had offered her assistance, and she could at least do this much for him. Before she was left alone once again.

* * *

Several hours later, they stumbled back into the secret room beyond the cellar wall, exhausted and pale. Hermione's shirt clung stickily to her shoulder, a narrow tear fringed with dangling threads and a large crimson stain.

"Will they look here?" Harry asked, as he unceremoniously dropped the knapsack over the arm of the sofa. She could feel his eyes boring into her back, as she moved across the room to the tiny loo, concealed from the rest of the room by a thick canvas curtain. And even when she had vanished behind the barrier, she still felt self-conscious as she stiffly lifted her shirt over her head.

"They know I was here once," she answered, only barely managing to stifle a gasp as the still oozing wound was pulled past its endurance. "They sweep it every now and then, but they've never found me." She leaned over the minuscule basin, using the mirror to more closely inspect the jagged hole. "Anti-Apparation wards only allow me in and out – that's why we ended up in the garden." She cast cleaning and healing spells, gritting her teeth as the burn indicated that her wound was knitting up. When she was finished, her shoulder was still a lurid red, but was no longer laid open, and she carefully affixed some gauze with a Sticking charm. There was a blue t-shirt hanging on a hook opposite the shower, and still moving her arm gingerly, she pulled it over her head.

"I've had Auror training in field medicine," Harry offered, as she came out, testing to see how far she could rotate her arm without pain. "Mind if I have a look at that?"

Hermione's eyebrows soared to her hairline. She imagined the fingers that had caressed her jaw and threaded through her hair tenderly probing the bare skin of her shoulder. _There's no way in hell I could handle that._

"I'm perfectly capable of casting a healing spell on myself, thank you."

There was an awkward silence that thickly permeated the entire room. Harry was watching her, and the look in his eyes made her face flame. Her gaze darted from him, like some frightened forest creature.

"So what happens now," she asked, as she studiously avoided looking at him.

"What?"

"What are you going to do… with that?" She inclined her head in the direction of the sofa, where he'd deposited the knapsack.

"Well, I … guess – if I can figure out how, that is – then I'll use my magical signature to calibrate a new crystal. Unless I'm closer to home than to her – which I doubt – that should lead me straight to her – or – or at least the universe where she is."

"So, after it's calibrated, you'll cast the incantation and you'll…go?" She could barely make herself articulate the last word. The thought of his leaving was almost debilitating; the thought of being alone once again in that cellar room, adrift in a hostile world with no hope of rescue or even abatement. She couldn't look at him.

"Yes." She heard his strangled whisper, and nodded mechanically in response, grasping instinctively for her iron control.

"Well then, I suppose we should…" she began, but Harry was not fooled.

"Hermione!"

"What? _What_ is there to say? We should get to work." She wanted to scream in frustration. Why was he insisting on forcing this painful conversation between the two of them? Better to pretend that none of it had ever happened.

"I – I don't want to leave you here like this."

Her eyes were mutinous. She did _not_ want his pity.

"Then take me with you," she spoke briskly, as though pointing out a simple and obvious solution. She busied herself with the retrieval of various items from the depths of the sack, setting them down on an adjacent table without much attention.

"I… can't," he drew out reluctantly, as she'd known he would. "I was hoping you'd understand."

The pain seized her throat in its impersonal, merciless grip again. She _did_ understand. But that did not make it hurt less.

"Understand what? I'm _Hermione Granger,_ your best friend, genetically identical to whoever it is you're looking for! Have I really changed that much in the few years where our universes diverged? Why can't you – why can't I – ?" She pressed her lips together to keep from saying anything more, mortified beyond repair.

"Why can't I what? Why can't I love you? You think I don't? Let me tell you something right now, Hermione – _I love you_ with my soul. Is that what you want to hear? I always have and I've never stopped. And I'll never forgive myself for not telling her – _you_ – when I had the chance. You are every bit as much Hermione as the girl who was taken from me. _But it's not about that._ "

"Then what is it about?" Her voice wobbled, her face burning hot from his declaration of emotion. She wondered if he even realized how his words made her heart seize up with simultaneous agony and joy.

"It's about doing what's right. It's about restoring Hermione to a universe from which she was stolen, taken against her will. It's not fair to leave her there. And if I took you both, one of you would be forced out of phase."

"You might not ever find her," she pointed out, coming perilously close to pleading with him to take her away from this place. She closed her eyes in self-loathing.

"I have to try… Besides, you would forever be fighting the pull of your own universe. I don't know what we'd have to do to keep you there. This is _your_ universe, where you belong…"

She folded up onto the sofa, her body's willingness to hold her up melting away at the stark finality of his words.

"Where I belong... oh, _God._ "

It was too much, and she was only vaguely aware of the compression of the sofa cushions as Harry came to sit next to her. His arm moved around her shoulders, being careful of her wound, when she began to cry.

"Leave this place, Hermione," he entreated. "Go to Australia, America, anywhere away from here. There's nothing to hold you here anymore. We _lost._ Harry – _I_ failed. It's over. You should go – try to make a life for yourself somewhere else."

Tears overflowed her burning eyes, and trickled in meandering paths down her cheeks. "I could never imagine a life without you. As long as I was fighting Death Eaters, standing up for what was right – it – it felt like I was keeping you alive… like I was still fighting for _you_. If – if I go – then you really _are_ dead." She recalled Ginny's words: _What is it we're really trying to accomplish here? Are we fighting just for the sake of fighting, kicking against the goads, just so we won't have to admit that we lost?_

"Maybe… maybe it's time you accept that." His voice was hesitant, and he wouldn't quite look at her, as if he knew she wouldn't let him off the hook so easily.

"Like you did?" There was no accusation in her voice; she was too emotionally fatigued for that.

"My journey isn't over yet."

They sat in silence for a long moment. Harry's fingers trailed down her arm, and played with the tail of her plait, curling the ends. She leaned into his side, feeling the warmth of him, the way his chest rose and fell rhythmically, and wished that it could stay like that always. She could not prevent a gusty and wistful sigh from escaping, but she forced herself to sit up.

"Then I'd best help you on your way." She was pleading with him wordlessly to drop the subject for her sake. There was another beat of silence between them, and Harry appeared to be conceding to her. "I don't even know where to begin," she admitted. "I'm not that well-versed on these theories…"

One of Harry's hands clapped his forehead.

"I completely forgot!" He retrieved a miniature book from the depths of his pocket, and passed it to Hermione after a rather hasty and excited _Engorgio._ Her eyes trailed over the title, stamped in shiny black against the worn leather: _Multiverse Theory_.

"You lifted this?"

"You think Lucius Malfoy will be pissed?" His green gaze twinkled at her, as he grinned, and she was as surprised as he was at the trill of genuine laughter that escaped her lips.

She flipped open the book, with the familiar hunger for knowledge and the challenge of a puzzle to be solved stealing over her. She was unsure how long she would have sat there on the sofa, hunched over the spidery script of the bound parchment, but for Harry's prodigious yawn.

"How long has it been since you've slept?" She asked severely, as he blinked his watery eyes. _It feels so good to watch after someone again,_ she thought fervently.

"Luna said I wouldn't tire while I was out of phase." He lifted his shoulders slightly, conveying that he had no idea how to answer her question. "This is the first time I've been in phase for any extended period of time, but I was up for over twenty-four hours before I left. I'm not even sure how much time has passed now – or how much passed while I was moving _between_ universes."

"Go to sleep. I'll work on this." Her voice was peremptory, emotionless, even while her heart contracted in sympathy. He'd been through so much just to get to this point, and what had she done? Cried all over him, made him feel guilty for things that weren't his fault, and bounced around from one emotion to another like someone wearing Spring-Spelled shoes. To cover her self-conscious flush, she widened the sofa, with a wave of her wand, and pointed him towards the sheets and blankets folded over the arm.

"Hermione, this is my – " He put up a token protest at the idea of letting her work, while he slept, but even as he said so, she could see the fatigue in his fluttering lashes.

"When have I ever _not_ helped you when you needed it? Besides, you won't be able to find her if you're dead on your feet, now will you?" She gave a valiant effort to infuse levity into her voice, and she thought Harry must have been quite tired indeed, since he appeared to buy it.

"I could help you…" Even as he spoke, he was drifting toward the sofa, yawning widely. She made up the bed, with a flick of her wand. His eyes were closing, even as he landed on the cushions.

"With any luck, I'll have this all sussed out by morning."

"Night, Hermione," he slurred, in a half-intelligible murmur, already more than half asleep, as far as she could tell. His breathing relaxed and slowed.

"Good night, Harry," she said, knowing that he had not heard her. She drank in his profile, marveled at how his face looked so much younger and less careworn in sleep. The low lamplight glinted off of the swept-back locks of his hair and off of the metal rims of his glasses, perched on the arm of the sofa, where he had placed them as he lay down. She longed to run her fingers through his hair, to smooth it back from his forehead, to touch him some way, _any_ way, so that she could assuage the great, raw void in her chest. He was here, but he was _not_ hers, and it hurt _so much_.

She had taken a half-step toward him, but did not complete the motion. With a deep, fortifying breath, she closed her eyes briefly, and turned away, tamping down her wayward emotions, and compelling herself to focus on the task at hand. Settling herself in her creaky desk chair, she tucked a flyaway strand of hair behind her ears, flipped open Harry's stolen leather book, and began to read it.

The night passed by as if in broomflight. The lamp oil burned low, the parchment streamed from her desk to furl on the floor, her fingers cramped around her racing quill. There was a fevered gleam in her eyes, as she hunched over the desk's surface, her lips pressed tightly together. She was no stranger to being goal-oriented, but this was for _Harry_ again, and it was bliss.

Her Muggle wristwatch gave the time as a quarter to four, when she thought she'd figured the whole thing out. She eyed the crystal speculatively, but decided against waking Harry. She'd heard nary a sound from the sofa as she'd worked, and knew how exhausted he'd been. _What's a couple of more hours?_ She asked herself philosophically.

But then, as she turned toward the sofa, she felt her heart accelerate wildly in her chest, pounding the blood up into her ears and face, at the mere prospect of sharing a bed with him, however literally the term applied. She toed off her trainers, and could feel the coolness of the smooth concrete floor even through her socks. _There's plenty of room_ , she told herself, _more than half of the bed._

Slowly, as if she feared his reaction, were he to wake and find her there, she eased her way onto the bed, casting a quick Duplicating charm on his pillow. His body heat warmed the Widened cushions, and even his scent clung to the copy of his pillow. Tears pricked at her eyelids, as she leaned over toward him, scarcely knowing what she was going to do, even as she went into motion.

She bent over and kissed him, softly, lingering only for a moment. His lips moved slightly, reflexively, providing counter pressure to hers, and she froze, poised for flight like a deer sensing danger. A ghost of a smile whispered across his face, and she waited, both hoping and fearing that he would stir and take her into his arms.

But he did not awaken. And she swallowed the lump of disappointment and anxiety, and turned away from him, hunching with her afghan as close to the edge of the bed as she dared, and praying for morning.

* * *

She awakened suddenly, instantly aware of his flame-fingered touch on her cheek, as he gently brushed her hair away from her face, making the motion that she had ached to make last night.

"I'm sorry, Hermione." His voice was low. His breath fanned her face. She sensed his closeness, and knew the razor's edge on which they both walked. If she just leaned a little, just the slightest yielding, and he would…

Instead, she sprang away from him as though she suspected him of nefarious intentions, dragging the tatty old afghan with her, fingers laced through some of its holes.

"You're awake," she said stupidly, blinking sleep out of her eyes. She was suddenly afraid what he might think of her, that he would think her guilty of some kind of manipulation, further play on emotions that were as volatile as hers. "I'm – I'm sorry… I tried not to take up much room, but – but the floor is cold, and – " All technically true statements, and yet she felt like she had been caught doing something wrong. _Damn Harry and his bloody nobility,_ she thought, only half-seriously, _it seems to rub off on people around him, across_ all _universes._

"Hermione," he broke into her whirling thoughts, one corner of his mouth quirking upward in a slight smile. "It's _your_ bed. If anything, I'm grateful that you didn't chuck _me_ out." She watched his gaze drift longingly toward her desk, his pilfered book open atop it, scads of parchment making rustly snowdrifts on the floor. She knew he wanted to ask about her progress, yet he refrained. "You were up much later than I was. Why don't you get back in bed and rest, and I'll get us some breakfast? How's your shoulder?"

"It's fine," she muttered, after shooting a cursory glance at the rapidly fading pink slash. He gripped her gently around her upper arms, just above her elbows, and herded her back toward the bed. _I wish he would stop touching me_ , she thought, as she sank bonelessly toward the mattress, again feeling the heat of his touch like she'd been branded.

"What do you usually eat?"

She felt her flush climb into her cheeks. She'd never been much interested in cooking on a good day, seeing food as something necessary for survival, and this tendency had only gotten worse when she had only herself to worry over. She would sometimes forget to eat at all until well past tea time. It was silly of her to somehow want to offer Harry some kind of elegant repast, but he seemed to be bringing rampant foolishness out in her every time he so much as glanced in her direction.

"Usually just toast," she admitted reluctantly. "There are some bananas under an Everfresh charm too; they should still be good." Harry appeared to have no opinion one way or the other as to the dullness of her meals, and began to move easily in her microscopic kitchenette, finding the items quickly and without undue fuss. Hermione watched him, feeling the pressure of the silence, of the hippogriff in the room, swelling up until she couldn't stand it any longer.

"Don't you want to know how much progress I made last night?"

"It can wait until after breakfast," Harry said airily, as he turned back toward her, with a plate in each hand. But she had seen the flash of hopeful desire, a kind of desperate and fearful yearning, banked in the embers of his eyes.

He was trying to spare her again, and it was damned irritating.

"I don't need your pity, Harry," she felt herself snarl. "Who wouldn't be eager to leave this wretched place?"

"I trust you remember exactly what I said to you last night?" _Let me tell you something, Hermione… I love you with my soul._ Her remembrance of his impassioned declaration stained her face, and he read it easily. "Then you also remember that the word 'pity' was nowhere to be heard, was it?"

A headache was beginning to throb in her temples, her pulse surging madly from her runaway heart. He did not intend to hurt her, she knew, but the prolonging of his inevitable departure was profoundly painful.

"I think I've got it," she dropped in a non sequitur. She watched him stiffen, heard the plates clatter loudly to the stovetop, as his numb hands dropped them from too high up.

"R—really?" He was still preparing breakfast, spreading marmalade on toast, and peeling the bananas, but any casual demeanor had vanished. His eyes were alert, watchful; his posture was poised, ready, waiting. _He wants to go._ She took the plate from him, and managed to swallow a mechanical bite without choking on it.

"Yes."

He seemed to have sensed her souring mood, and they ate their breakfast without further speech. As they sent their plates back over to the worktop of the kitchenette, Hermione found herself drawing upon every shred of inner strength she had left. _This is not Harry's fault. Your situation is not his fault. He has a task to accomplish, and you can help him do that. Falling apart will_ not _help him do that._

"Are you ready?" She was proud of the cool and professional tone of her voice. Perhaps she could do this with maturity, and perhaps he would one day look back on their encounter with fondness. _Small comfort_.

"Reckon so." A piercing glance from him made her wonder if he could sense the façade she had conjured.

"Stand up." She tapped him with her wand, and spoke the Latin incantation as if she had learned it long before last night. She felt almost as astonished as Harry looked, when glowing blue runes began to etch themselves in the air, before their eyes.

"Is that my – ?"

"Magical signature? Yes, it is." She gestured with her wand, forcing herself to focus on the subject matter, rather than to whom she was speaking. She pulled the newly acquired theories from memory, merged with what she had already known, and speaking as if she were an expert. She felt some of her tension ease; this was where she had always excelled, after all. "This one is your individual rune – most scholars think there are no two alike – even twins' are usually slightly different. This is a family rune," she moved down the line, pointing at each rune in turn, "and this one has to do with one's astrological sign, and this one is a sort of personality rune. It – it isn't absolute by any means, but one example shows that those sorted into Gryffindor house generally have this specific rune in common, as do the other houses for other runes. And then, _this_ one –" She showed Harry the one farthest to the left, darting a glance at him; he appeared transfixed. " – for a long time has been known as the 'constant'. In all my classes and studies, this one has been the same in every magical person."

"Then which one do we – ?" He stopped talking when Hermione cast the same spell on herself, and her own magical signature began to write itself in the air under his. She felt her breath catch with that old familiar delight in being right, in correctly solving something, when she compared the two magical signatures. The 'personality' rune was identical, supporting the academic theory behind House Sorting. But all of the other runes – even the 'constant' – were different. Harry caught on almost immediately.

"Why are _those_ different?"

"I was right," she breathed triumphantly, unable to help herself, as she grinned. "Our constants are different, because you are not from this universe. She tilted her head toward her overflowing desk, where Luna's leather book still lay open. "Luna had just begun to explore that aspect, but, of course, there's never been anyone around from another universe on whom to test the theory."

"So everyone – everyone from my universe has this rune?" Harry lifted one hand, without seeming to realize he'd done so, as if to caress the 'constant'. " _She_ has this rune? And that's what will draw me to her?" His eyes were luminous in the blue glow, and it was as if he were seeing _her,_ as if his hands were already touching _her_ , as the possibilities became probabilities right in front of him.

Hermione was all business, taking the blank crystal and embedding the imprint of Harry's constant within it. She watched the crystal flare blue briefly, then fade, and was sure that it had worked.

" _Increpitare,"_ she finalized the imprint, and held the crystal out to him, dangling from her fingers on its gold chain. "It's done."

"It's done? That's it?"

 _That's it?_ Her smile threatened to twist in on itself bitterly. As if this weren't one of the hardest things she'd ever had to do? She gave him his final instructions, her voice staying cool, precise, impersonal, even while her heart, already fractured from the losses she'd endured over and over, splintered in new ways, branching out from the original fault lines.

When she stumbled to a halt, her direction completed, the silence remained, oppressively blanketing the room in awkwardness. Harry's eyes darted toward the blank section of wall where the doorway had appeared.

"I should probably…go out – just – just in case." His stammering was all but incoherent, but she got the gist.

"Right," she replied, and her voice was sounding less natural by the second. "You wouldn't want to risk materializing where this room isn't, and be buried alive." _Such lovely, sunshiny thoughts, Hermione!_ Her eyes swept over him and past him, without really seeing him, and she moved smoothly toward the wall to activate the door.

"You don't have to – " He protested, as she followed him out.

"I want to," she interrupted him, and it was both true and false. They clambered through the broken window into the unkempt garden. The dawn was cool and gray, and a fine sheen of dew covered every surface. Hermione could feel the damp seeping in through her trainers, as they high-stepped their way through the long grass into an open part of the yard. Harry had slipped one hand inside the collar of his shirt, and was tangling the chain in his fingers. He had sort of a dazed look of wonderment on his face, like everything he'd ever hoped for was finally being given to him. She watched him with wet eyes, and was able, through the haze of pain, to hope that he would find her. _He deserves it._

"I wanted to thank you for – for everything you've…" He was speaking to her as if they were strangers, or as if he were giving a report to a superior.

"It's just me, Harry," she whispered hoarsely, through the clog in her throat.

"That's what makes it so hard." His voice echoed hers, and she could see the shine of tears in his eyes. He did not break eye contact with her, even as one hand checked blindly that his wand was in place.

Hermione could tell that she didn't have long before she came completely unglued, so she took a fortifying breath, and stuck her hand out.

"Good-bye, Harry. Best of luck." Her voice was brightly artificial, and she quelled the urge to vomit.

"Good-bye, Hermione," he gritted out, but completely bypassed her proffered hand. Instead, he scooped her into his arms for a full contact hug that took her breath away. Her hands were splayed across his back, and she pressed into him, closing her eyes and imprinting in her memory the exact feel of him at that very moment.

She thought of the way she knelt over Harry's prone body, as the light left his eyes, as the death rattle sounded in his chest, of the promises never brought to fruition, of the farewells never exchanged. She wasn't even sure if he was aware of her at the end. She thought of the way his breath had fanned her face, the way his fingers skimmed hers, the way his eyes spoke volumes, and how only hours later, she had lost all of it.

 _Good-bye, Harry. I love you so much. I see now it is not your destiny to be with me. So go, go to your rest, your peace. You deserve that. But oh, how it hurts, and how much I am going to miss you. Please don't forget about me, for I will never forget about you._

And then she was lifting her face to look up at this Harry, and he was already staring down at her, tears studded on his dark lashes. She felt his lips touch her forehead, and then he was angling toward her mouth. She stood on tiptoe to reach him more easily, and he kissed her, lightly, slowly, as if fulfilling some kind of solemn rite. _He's saying good-bye too_ , she thought. _For all he knows, I could be the closest thing to his Hermione that he ever sees again._

" _Adjicio universum."_ He spoke the incantation, and still his eyes did not leave hers. She forced her lips upward into a smile, even while the tears trickled unchecked down her face.

"I meant what I said before," he said. His voice sounded as if it came from a great distance, over a bad telephone connection. "Don't stay here, Hermione, live your life. I love you."

And then, without any warning, not even a crack like Apparation, he was gone. She stood there for a moment, knee-deep in wet grass, as birds began to awaken in the tree tops, still smiling at nothing, and crying for everything her life was missing and everything it had become.

"I love you too." Her words were garbled and choked, and no one was there to hear them anyway. She moved mechanically back toward her cellar room, going through the motions of entry with no conscious thought, feeling like a marionette being forced to move at the whim of a puppeteer.

The emptiness of her hideaway assaulted her, and she had never felt more imprisoned than she did now, as the door vanished behind her. She wanted to throw herself onto the unmade bed, and give in to her despair; perhaps she could catch the lingering scent of him in the bed linens.

Instead, thinking that her initial urge was exactly the opposite of what he would want her to do, she looked toward her desk, where the book on Multiverse Theory still lay open, beckoning to her.

 _If there are infinite possibilities out there, if I could come up with a way to alter my 'constant', perhaps there is a Harry out there who needs me as much as I need him._ She felt the first embers of hope spring to life in the ashes of her dreams, and knew that – whatever else happened – this travelling Harry had done this for her.

And for that, he would always have her thanks.

 **To Be Continued…**

 **Okay, from here on out should be where Shadow Walks and Shadow Walker diverge. I hope everyone will enjoy what I have planned next.**

 **You may leave a review on your way out, if you like. I really hope you do – in times of diminished activity, they would really be much appreciated!**

 **-** _ **lorien**_


	9. Chapter 9

_**Shadow Walker**_

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **-Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

* * *

 **Chapter Nine:**

 _ **I'm a wandering soul. I'm walking the line that leads me home.**_

 _ **-Switchfoot, "Enough to Let Me Go"**_

* * *

She cringed, caught her breath, waiting, the anticipation of the pain nearly worse than the pain itself - but the wave of agony did not disappoint. She had no sensation of falling, but air jolted into her lungs as her knees hit the concrete floor. Black spots splashed, wavered, vanished, and reformed across her field of vision. She felt clammy and shaky, as if she had just been violently ill.

Crouched on all floors, she spread her fingers out to take in the cool smoothness of the cellar floor, and forced herself to breathe regularly. Her furniture slowly swam back into focus.

And so did the rune. Hovering, with a serene glow, its position over her head seemed to symbolize how the solution remained tantalizingly out of reach. It seemed to mock her; Hermione had the thought and simultaneously rejected its irrationality.

Nevertheless, she had been working for days, had turned Luna's pilfered book inside out and upside down, but she was no closer… no closer to the final answer she needed.

She needed a way to change her Constant, needed to know that it was at least _possible_ to alter it, to permanently substitute another. Loss after loss had buffeted her against rocks of despair, and she did not think she could endure it again. Her nightmares terrified her, and they were not of wandering endless alternate timelines, but of _finding_ Harry, and then losing him again, unable to stay anchored in a universe that was not her own. She loathed the idea of placing so much dependence on a fragile piece of jewelry made from a mineral formation

 _If only I knew that it_ could _be done,_ she thought wistfully, pushing herself into a sitting position, _then when I found him, when I found a Harry for me, then I could change my Constant, change it to_ his _._

Unfortunately, while a Constant could be painlessly cloaked or masked by the crystal, to actually force the rune itself to change form was toying with one's essence, one's very magical being. It hurt like hell, and so far, had not resulted in any significant alteration.

" _I don't know what we'd have to do to keep you there… This is your universe, where you belong…"_

Harry's gentle voice rang softly in her mind. He was gone, not yet three weeks, but seemed as distantly and irretrievably gone as _her_ Harry, whose death was both mournfully long ago and painfully fresh. She wondered absently if he'd made it, if he'd found her, and was surprised when tears splashed onto the worn knees of her jeans.

She was unsure how long she knelt there, slumped, the very picture and personification of defeat, the last one left to remember when everything went so very wrong. Maybe she couldn't do this, she thought. Maybe it was her fate, her destiny to be the one who remained, alone, to relive the loss.

 _Fate?_ _Since when did you put any stock in fate?_ In another burst of cruelty, her inner voice sounded like Harry. _Just go, Hermione - why are you stalling? What is left for you here?_

 _Stalling? That's ridiculous. Anyone would be champing at the bit to get out of this wretched place. I'm not stalling. I'm … preparing._

 _Futile attempts to make a thing permanent, when you don't even know if it will happen at all? Sounds like stalling to me._ She imagined Harry, strolling casually into the room, saying this with a crooked, teasing half-smile, shirt sleeves rolled up, hands tucked carelessly into pockets. Her throat stung with a renewed supply of tears to suppress. She took a moment to damn the Other Harry for freshening up her thoughts of him. It had never been very easy to tuck him away in the recesses of her mind, but it had become far less so since he had visited.

She straightened up, uncurling her spine and taking a clinical look around the room, before letting a gusty sigh escape her, smearing her tears with her hands and the frayed sleeves of her shirt, as though she could pretend they'd never happened. Inner-Harry was right, she decided. She was stalling.

She tried to muster up her self-righteous, revenge-driven, Harry-inspired hatred for the Minister of Magic, but ended up feeling only guilt for the thousands of innocent people she - _they_ \- had let down with their defeat. _Even if all my efforts suddenly succeeded beyond my wildest dreams, even if Malfoy and all his cronies were ousted and the Wizarding world saw the error of its ways … it still wouldn't bring any of them back._ _There is nothing to keep me here, nothing left for me here… nothing but a pointless feud with a pure-blooded bigot who has always hated me for no other reason than who my parents were._

 _You did kill his son_ , Harry's gentle reminder prodded her, but it was only in a place that had once been tender, a raw and pulsing wound. Now it was only scar tissue, dense and unfeeling.

 _How many people did I kill? During the war… after the war… And I can't even make myself care about any of them. What have I turned into? How could anyone - much less someone like Harry - love me, seeing what I have become?_

 _I've never stopped loving you, Hermione_. And it was like he was in the room with her, lighting it up by his mere presence, _her_ Harry, younger than the one who'd recently visited, with less haunted misery in his eyes. How she missed him! _And I never would, no matter what you'd done, what you'd been driven to do._

Her thoughts followed their own sad, contorted rabbit trail. _Maybe that's why he left, why he wanted to find her - maybe I'm no longer fit for -_

 _Hermione…_ Harry's voice was gentle, but a strand of desperation wove through it. _Hermione, you need to go._

 _I know, I'm stalling…_ she inwardly replied, with some chagrin, _and going mad, quite likely._ Almost in a reverie, still marveling at how close he seemed, she _Accio_ ed her duffel, and began methodically filling it with changes of clothing, one armload of books, and the few toiletries she regularly utilized. Luna's book and the various notes she'd taken, she shrank and put in a flat felt portfolio, envelope-size, looping it around her neck and under her clothing with a leather thong.

 _Hermione!_ And suddenly she remembered her mother's dazed, glassy, dying eyes, fixated over her shoulder, seeing and hearing a Harry who was not really there, but who was warning her of very real danger.

" _He says you need to go now._ "

There was a low, threatening rumble, even as the realization hit her with all the force of whatever had hit the house above. The very foundations of Harry's childhood home shook, and a fine spray of dirt misted down on her head with a menacing sibilance. The few pieces of mismatched china rattled in the little cabinet.

Her eyes flew, panicked, to her ward map, the entirety of which was blinking manically. There was another ominous rumble, and she heard splintering wood, the faint screech of nails ripped from their resting places. More dirt sifted down, a few clods bouncing down with dull thunks.

Keeping her head low, she Summoned a few last items into her duffel bag, and made an attempt at Apparation. Her wards were keyed to her, but Hermione suspected that they'd erected additional barriers to trap her.

 _Ol' Lucius finally ran out of patience, yeah?_ Now she heard Ron's casual and cheeky cadence in her mind. The charmed cinder blocks that hid her little hole from the world were beginning to slide askew, a crack threading its meandering path among them. As far as she knew, her own wards and her self-cast Fidelius would keep the Ministry from ever actually seeing her. _But that's of no use, if you're dead in a pile of rubble with an entire house atop you_ , she thought ruefully, half-wondering if the reason her two boys suddenly seemed so close was that she was on the cusp of joining them.

It was not an unwelcome thought.

But she knew, before she even slung the duffel bag across her shoulders, before her feet were in motion, that she was going to run. She slid sideways through the widening crack where her hidden archway had been, and took precious seconds to dislodge her bag when it became wedged. She hoisted herself up to the first existing step, and took the rest of them two at a time. No longer even trying for any kind of stealth, she Shrunk her bag and stuffed it into a pocket, then burst through the door low, in a poised crouch.

There was a vibration, a sort of low-level electric hum that felt as if it stood her hair on end. It surged through the air around her and wafted harmlessly away. But then she watched in horror as the colors of her magic became visible, the spells and protections she had wrought hanging in the air, entwined around the place that had become the only semblance of a home she had. Her jaw dropped.

 _This shouldn't be possible…_ If they could see her wards, know exactly what they were up against, then they could dismantle them. _Innovative goons, indeed,_ she thought with chagrin, recalling Ron's words during their ill-fated attempt to rescue Ginny. Hermione still felt the security of her Fidelius, but was taking no chances, moving in a smooth soundless arc, trying to avoid the windows.

There was a crackly, sound-system kind of noise, the harbinger of a badly cast _Sonorus_ , and an unidentified voice said simply, " _Perfringo Fidelium."_ The clinical part of her brain was still in the process of registering that _perfringo_ was Latin for "to penetrate" or "to shatter", when the pain, _Crucio_ -like in its intensity, twisted her in its grasp and sent her to the floor.

Her fingers curved into talons and scrabbled ineffectually at the wooden floor. She didn't realize she was biting her lip to keep from crying out until she became distantly aware of blood trickling down her chin. When the pain began to abate, she tried to sit up, breathing as if she had just run a sprint, and daubing at the blood on her mouth. _They broke the Fidelius. They broke_ my _Fidelius._ Her ears were ringing, and her peripheral vision had blackened at the edges.

Two curses seared the air above her head, gouging chunks out of the wooden door frame. The entire house shuddered again, as if it were made out of gelatin, and Hermione had the incredible sensation that the whole thing was sliding to one side. There was a series of shattering crashes, as tiles began to rain down off the roof in quick succession.

She had obviously underestimated Lucius Malfoy and the hatred and determination that drove him to push the very boundaries of magic just to capture her. Her hand trailed up to the crystal pendant. Could she activate it here? She thought it probably transcended things like anti-Apparation wards, but she wasn't sure she was willing to risk it. There was also the very real possibility that she would be interrupted mid-transfer by the Ministry.

"Hermione Granger! Undesirable Number One!" The resounding echo of the _Sonorus_ charm rattled what glass was left in the windows. "The Ministry has permitted your acts of terrorism to continue without reprisal long enough. You are under arrest, charged with twenty-one counts of murder. You shamelessly dishonor the memory of Harry Potter with your actions. Your _Fidelius_ is obsolete, and headquarters are surrounded. Unforgivable Curses have been authorized. Drop your wand out the window, and give yourself over to the waiting Auror squad, and you may escape grave bodily injury for now."

Hermione was no longer listening. Her lip had curled into a snarl at the insinuation that she was guilty of some kind of dishonor, and before the didactically read tirade had been completed, she had formulated her next course of action. A long, slender splinter of wood jutted out from the edge of the cellar door frame, where a curse had partially dissected it. She wrenched it the rest of the way loose with one hand, and transfigured it into a copy of her wand.

"Okay! Okay, I'll - here's my wand." Her voice trembled, and she did not have to feign her fear and uncertainty. She threw the duplicate through the front window, and heard a furtive scuffling outside as it was retrieved. She knew that the wand would be scanned for registration, and that her ruse would only last a moment, but she hoped it would be all she needed.

The disembodied voice resumed. "You will move to the center of the room, and remain motionless. Please place your hands on top of your head, and wait for the Aurors. You will not speak. You will - "

She heard footsteps in the directions of both the front and back doors. This was real. They were coming for her. Her final trip to the Ministry had been the last straw, and Lucius Malfoy would find her and make an example of her, no matter who had to die to accomplish it.

" _Incendio!"_ she hissed, aiming at the fireplace. It was completely non-functional, but still carefully stacked with logs - logs that she had painstakingly coated with an explosive powder as a last-ditch security measure. Without waiting to see if her spell-aim was true, she propelled herself down the hallway toward the bedrooms, and Vanished the glass in window of Harry's old nursery, without even slowing down.

There was a resounding explosion at about the same time she dove through the window. She curled herself into a ball, and rolled twice upon her impact with the ground. All the air left her lungs in a noisy wheeze, and the sky tilted crazily above her. She had landed in a fringe of brush, and she tensed, as she heard hoarse shouts and cries above the crackle of flames. But there were no crunching footfalls, no snapping rush of spellfire.

She turned her head and smiled. The house was an inferno.

 _Stupid_ , she thought. _All that new spellwork, but they don't know me at all_. _Even after all this time._

She lay motionless in the leaves, trying to collect her scattered thoughts, and hoping that she hadn't broken anything in her bag when she rolled over it. There were shouts of alarm, urgently called instructions, and the scorching hiss of _Aguamenti_ meeting potion-birthed fire. She knew she didn't have much time before they began scouring the grounds for her.

A twinge of pain squeezed her heart. She had been hoping for a chance to visit Harry's memorial one more time. But the churchyard was too close to the house, and she had no way of knowing if Lucius had staked it out ahead of time, or indeed, if it was even out from under the Ministry-cast anti-Apparation umbrella.

But then she thought of how close he'd seemed, only moments ago. The two Harrys seemed to meld into one, and both were entreating her to leave. Her eyes stung with tears, and she slowly reached up to her neck, tugging at the chain until she pulled the crystal from under her clothing.

"I miss you so much," she choked out, her voice not any louder than the wind-tossed rustle of leaves. She took one deep, fortifying breath and closed her eyes. " _Adjicio universum._ "

* * *

She felt as if she were motionless, still in the same bed of leaves and crushed bracken, as the sky, with its edging of treetops, spun around her like a carousel. After a moment, when she was sure that the world around her had stilled, she carefully stood, bracing her hand on a nearby tree trunk and noting that her hand did not pass through it.

 _In phase then_ , she thought, and wordlessly Disillusioned herself. The larger body of the forest that had been behind her, forming the back boundary of the Potter property, was much diminished in size, and could perhaps be called a copse of trees. She could see the green tinge of a lushly manicured expanse of lawn, and there appeared to be no house there at all. The murmur of voices, low laughter, cheers, and the shrieks of playing children reached her ears. She suddenly felt self-conscious, even knowing she was Disillusioned, and her hand drifted up to pluck a couple of dead leaves out of her snarled hair.

Where Harry had experienced the greatest loss in his life, there was now a park. There were benches, a walking trail, and a playground that appeared almost new. A brass and wrought iron sign was angled at one corner, and she could read, "—tter Memorial Park". A wistful smile twisted up one corner of her mouth, as she watched a tow-headed toddler hurtle down a short slide, squealing at the top of her lungs. She thought the whole park a lovely gesture, and wondered if Harry had done it.

Her eyes roved everywhere, as her feet found the footpath, and she wandered toward town, careful to avoid the joggers. Godric's Hollow was bustling. The charming quaintness of the cottages lining the cobblestoned roads was unchanged, but she found that the homey little buildings now housed various eclectic shops offering antiques and curios and rare artifacts. She had just begun wondering if the town was even magical, when a display in a bookshop window of a first edition cookery book by Helga Hufflepuff settled _that_ question. It was a little like a more upscale Hogsmeade, she decided, and contemplated removing her Disillusionment charm.

She had just decided against doing so - at least until she had seen Harry and Ron, and knew the lay of the land, so to speak - when she rounded a blind corner and collided with someone headed in the opposite direction. She would have known the line of those shoulders and that mop of dark hair anywhere.

"Harry!" She gasped breathlessly, before she could stop herself. He instantly reacted to his name, and then did a double take at her faint outline, using Finite on her spell without so much as a by-your-leave. Color flooded her cheeks, as he bent over her hand and his lips grazed it lightly. The move was courtly and stomach-fluttering, but so unlike the Harry she knew that she only barely repressed a laugh.

"I see you know me, but I haven't had the pleasure," he murmured. As he straightened his posture, he raked her with a toe-to-head onceover, which was admiring and appreciative, without quite being lascivious, but was nevertheless not like Harry. Their gazes locked for the first time, and Hermione froze.

He was undoubtedly Harry, had even confirmed himself as such, though his glasses and clothes were obviously more expensive, and his hair, upon closer inspection, seemed more artfully tousled than merely unruly. But it was the warm shine of his eyes that caught the bulk of her attention.

They were brown.

"My name's Hermione," she managed, after her mouth had opened and closed a few times, as she tried desperately to keep herself from saying something stupid about green eyes.

"Your parents were aficionados of Shakespeare?"

"Yes, they were. And it was unfortunately the cause of many tiresome explanations in primary school." _There! That came off almost naturally_. He laughed, as she'd intended him to, and then said something lovely about the uniqueness of the name suiting her.

Hermione felt as if she were struggling mightily to keep her footing on a surface that was shifting beneath her unpredictably. Had she really thought that a few conversations with a universe-hopping Harry Potter would prepare her for the reality of doing the same herself? On some level, she'd realized that there would be differences, that _he_ could be different - in fact, _would_ be different, but that had been from an observer's point of view, regarded with a clinical amount of detachedness.

 _This_ was real. And she was going to have to decide very quickly how she was going to handle it. She couldn't constantly compare any Harry she might meet to the Harry she knew, the one who was gone permanently. She didn't suppose that the lack of green eyes was a deal breaker after all. But she had been hoping for someone a little more similar, a little more familiar.

He clearly did not know her at all, so either Hermione Granger had never existed in this universe, or had died young, mourned only in the Muggle world. Would their personalities mesh as well as they had in a universe _lang syne_? It was more than unnerving, starting over at square one with someone she'd once known as well as she knew herself. _At least Harry's search had a clear objective,_ she thought with some disgust. _I'm using the multiverse as my own personal dating game. That's got to be a new level of pathetic._

"And you're running from…?" He waited expectantly for her to answer, and it took her a moment to understand that he was likely questioning about the Disillusionment.

"Saw an ex I'd rather avoid," she ventured, hoping she sounded nonchalant enough. She'd never been very handy at lying. "I've - I've never been here before," she stammered, when the silence was beginning to get awkward. "Do you know it well?"

"You could say that," he replied drily. "My father owns it."

"He d - does?" She stumbled over the present tense.

"Yes. He began work on it after my mother died." A slight shadow flickered in his dark eyes. "He said it kept his mind off things. Off me mostly, I think." He mostly succeeded in making his remark sound light, but something in his face warned her against further exploration in that direction.

"I came through the park. It's lovely."

"Thank you, I'll tell my father you said so. The park was my idea. For her." Somehow, this gratified Hermione. _At least I still know_ some _things about him._

"I'm - I'm sorry … about your mother."

"Don't be," he replied, and looked embarrassed that he had let the conversation get away from him. "I had a mother who loved me, even if I don't really remember her very well. I suppose there are some people who never even had that."

"Ugh, you're so predictable, Potter," came an unseen voice from somewhere over Harry's shoulder. "You're late, of course, and I _knew_ that you'd be out here chatting up some b - _Hi!_ " The voice became over-bright, as its owner came into view, and Hermione knew that that was just what had been intended.

"Knock it off, Es. Merlin, you're prickly today! Slip your wand in the wrong place or something?" Hermione caught a flash of brilliant green, as the new arrival glared at Harry.

"Insulting me by way of being completely crass shows an utter lack of imagination on your part," she drawled loftily, and Hermione's eyes widened in disbelieving recognition at the precise nuances in the voice. She would have known those tones anywhere. "Esmeralda Snape." Hermione shook the proffered hand. "How d'you do?"

She was not exactly pretty, in a conventional way, Hermione thought, but she certainly would have attracted attention wherever she went. Her hair was so inky black that it seemed to completely absorb all light, and her skin was as fair and translucent as her hair was dark. Her lashes and brows were as dark as her hair, and this made the fact that they framed bright green eyes quite startling.

"Your mum married Snape?" Hermione breathed without thinking, her mind trying to come to terms with this new arrangement of facts.

"I'm sorry?" Harry was eyeing her curiously, his head slightly tilted to one side. Hermione noticed that he bore no scar.

"I was asking about Snape… er, that is, your father - does he - ?"

"Teach at Hogwarts? Or plague my life? Yes and yes." But affection for her father glimmered in Esmeralda's eyes, belying her irritated words.

"Do you know Dumbledore?" Hermione asked quickly, before one of them decided to ask her how she knew about Snape, since she had clearly not attended Hogwarts with them.

"The Headmaster? Sure. Bit of a barmy old man, but decent enough when we were in school, I suppose." Harry had answered this question, and spoke detachedly, as though he had had little personal interaction with the venerable wizard. He nudged his companion in the side mischievously. "Course, Es would know him better than I would. She visited his office quite a bit, if I recall correctly."

Esmeralda made a face at him.

"You know as well as I do that the Snakes always got blamed for everything. And Father wanted to make sure nobody thought he was playing favorites. I behaved… most of the time. Saint Harry over here never got into trouble. Bloody `Puff."

Harry had been sorted into Hufflepuff? Hermione clamped her lips shut, determined to stop evincing surprise over things that a normal person would find unremarkable, especially regarding two strangers she had just met. But her facial expression must have given her away, for Esmeralda laughed and Harry blew an irritated sigh between his lips.

"It's not a bad House, okay? And people _don't_ get sorted there just because they're too stupid or weak to be put into the other Houses." There was mock defensiveness in his tone. Esmeralda chortled behind him.

"Yes, you're very _loyal_."

"Now you sound like Ron Weasley," he retorted.

The smile fell off of Esmeralda's face as though it had been magicked off. Something indefinable glittered in the depths of her eyes. Hermione wondered what story was behind that. Another flash of those green eyes up at Harry, and Hermione was hit with another undeniable truth.

 _Merlin's beard, she's in love with him._ She wondered what was in the very essence of Potter men that seemed to elicit such devotion.

Harry was instantly contrite. He looped his arm around the other girl, and pulled her into the shoulder of his jacket.

"I'm sorry, Es. That was a rotten thing to say."

"I'm used to it," came muffled from the folds of cloth. "You're a very rotten person, really." There was no animosity in her voice. When she reappeared, the wistfulness was so deeply buried that only someone like Hermione, who knew what it was like, would have noticed it. "C'mon, let's go have our drink. You can even bring your whatsername."

"Hermione," Harry filled in, grinning at her. Hermione felt her insides warm under the light of that smile. Perhaps she could learn to -

But as she took that first step forward, she had a sensation of starting to fall, perhaps over a cobblestone, though she had not felt herself trip. She lurched unevenly, and she felt Harry's hands gripping her upper arms. She could hear him asking her if she was all right, but his voice seemed shrouded in a staticky roar, coming from very far away.

And then, just that quickly, the world was in focus again, the cobbles steady beneath her feet, and the stone wall of the adjacent shop smooth and cool at her back. Harry still held onto her, but now his breath was warm against her face, his lips grazing the lobe of her ear, the pulse point in her neck. His weight was bearing her into the wall, and he was pressed against her in a way that was most definitely not casual. Panicked, her eyes darted over his shoulder, and she saw that the streets were much quieter, almost deserted, and that Esmeralda had completely disappeared.

"Ah, come on, Hermione," he whispered, his dark eyes sweeping over her agitated face. "You can't just - "

She kneed him in the groin. As he drew in a deep, wheezing breath and his legs threated to buckle, she staggered away from him, arms thrown out wide, preparing to run if she had to. Almost belatedly, she dug into her pocket for her wand. Harry was bent against the wall, having somehow managed to keep his feet, but he looked to be in no condition to be chasing after her.

He knew who she was. They were in the same exact place. But Esmeralda was gone, and they were definitely not acting in the same way. _I jumped universes. I must have jumped to one right `next door' though, where there was another Hermione, just like me, doing the same thing I was - well, almost anyway, and …_

She didn't have time to make an analogy about a stone being skipped across a tranquil pond, because her environment began to fade around her once again. There was a single stomach-churning swoop of a sensation. She briefly registered Harry's shocked gaze on hers.

And then she was somewhere else entirely.

 **TBC**


	10. Chapter 10

_**Shadow Walker**_

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **-Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

* * *

 _ **Between the lines of fear and blame, you begin to wonder why you came.**_

 _ **-The Fray, "How to Save a Life"**_

* * *

 **Chapter Ten:**

Hermione had the sensation of a lurching movement, though whether she was the object in motion, or her very environment was shifting around her, she could not tell. There were streaks of light and blurs of activity around her, but she found herself unable to distinguish or differentiate between them in any way, before the dizzying speed would whip her onward. Her foray into the study of physics was spotty at best, but if she were accurate in comparing her situation as being like a stone skipped off the surface of a lake, she should be slowing down, as she gradually _lost_ energy.

At least she thought so.

And then, all analytical thought was quite forcefully driven from her mind, as the building closest to her suddenly "grew" a raised front porch in one of the universes through which she careened. The unyielding stone lip collided with the side of her head hard enough to knock her to the ground and make her eyes stream. She could feel the grit between the lumpy cobblestones beneath the pads of her fingers, and she struggled to rise to her feet before something else changed, and she ended up with her extended legs merged into a fence or garbage bin or something.

She wobbled gracelessly into a standing position, trying to ignore the furious throbbing in her temple. A ginger touch discovered a sizable knot, and her fingers came away reddened. At the same time, her breakneck journey seemed to come to an end, the world around her see-sawing back and forth a couple of times, before finally subsiding into stillness. She felt like someone who had lost her sea-legs, and tried to mentally tamp down her rising nausea. Blinking her eyes hard, in an effort to focus her attention on her surroundings, she took a first look at this particular version of Godric's Hollow.

It seemed less like an adorable, kitschy-cute tourist town, and more like a run-of-the-mill English village. Hermione took a couple of experimental steps to make sure she wasn't going to fall, and risked the most basic of painkilling charms to take the edge off her head injury. She had become decent at field healing, out of necessity, but still did not feel that casting spells on _herself_ when she felt like she was either going to vomit or pass out – or possibly both – was the best of ideas. As almost an afterthought, she pulled the crystal necklace out of her shirt, and murmured the incantation that would deactivate it, something she had uncharacteristically neglected earlier. The thought of spinning through any more universes was enough to make her stomach pretzel in on itself.

She managed to turn herself back in the direction from which she had originally come, as the wrought iron street lamps begin to light themselves in the deepening twilight. Down this road had been the memorial park for Harry's mother; down this road had been the boarded up, abandoned Potter home that she had lived in for so long.

Truthfully, she had no idea what to expect this time.

She had to stop twice and allow her swimming head to clear, leaning on the low wall that bordered each side of the rutted lane. It took much longer than she would have thought, and the remnants of the sunset had disappeared completely by the time the house came into view.

It was obvious at one glance that somebody lived in the house. Lights streamed from various windows, and the lawn was meticulously maintained. A mounted lamp by the front door displayed its shiny coat of fresh, forest green paint. A white gate bridged the gap in the low stone wall that continued bordering the road, but Hermione eschewed that to clamber clumsily over the wall, making for the kitchen window at the side of the house, rather than the front door. She tensed as she felt a thrum vibrate her very bones, a warm rush of magic coating her skin that meant she had passed through wards – fairly hefty ones too, she surmised. Her skull pounded in protest, as she dropped to a crouch, waiting for the residents to come spilling out into the garden, wands blazing.

Nothing happened, and, when it became clear after several heartbeats that nothing was going to happen, Hermione resumed her stealthy progress around the house. She murmured heartfelt thanks under her breath when she saw the long sweeping arms of a willow adjacent to a brightly lit kitchen window. She cast a Disillusionment charm on herself, and crept under the sheltering branches to peer inside the house.

Gingham curtains jauntily bordered the window over the sink, and their hems flapped lazily in the four-inch gap between the sash and sill. Hermione could hear the indistinct babble of casual conversation, amid the clinks and rattles of dinnerware. She sidled through the flowing willow fronds, and cautiously peered inside.

There he was. Sitting casually at the table, elbows spread, dark green shirt sleeves rolled up over his forearms, raven-wing hair as disheveled as ever, he quirked a self-deprecating half-smile at his companion, as the overhead light reflected off the metallic frames of his glasses. He answered something in a low murmur that she could not quite catch, and she moved her attention to the woman with whom he ate.

Hermione recognized her. Her hair was blonder that she remembered, and her face had lost any girlish roundness, but there was no mistaking who it was. And no mistaking the look on her face. Even as Hermione assessed her, she looked across at Harry, and there was transparent, affectionate joy in her sparkling eyes.

Hermione knew her heart hadn't actually stopped beating, if only because she could feel her pulse throbbing painfully in her head. Still, the odd agonized pang of seeing Harry with Susan Bones could not be ignored, even as the churning in her stomach ramped up to a new level. She had lost the ability to even attempt rational thinking about the whole situation, as the window before her blurred, divided, and merged back together.

And then several things happened at once.

Somewhere in the depths of the house, a small child cried. It immediately arrested Harry and Susan's attention. Harry paused with a forkful of vegetables en route to his mouth, but Susan laid a hand on Harry's arm and offered to retrieve "her". Hermione saw both wedding bands then, glinting in the kitchen light the way Harry's glasses had. The nausea came over her so quickly that it was almost overwhelming. She staggered backwards, stepping heavily on a fallen branch that cracked like a flicked whip. She vaguely registered Harry's startled gaze flashing up at the open window, as she fell to her knees and retched. Her vision had tunneled; she could feel the grass beneath her fingers and her hair clinging to her cheeks and neck, but she could barely see. The pain in her head had ratcheted up to an untenable frequency, and when she heard the front door open and close, it sounded as if it did so from a very great distance.

* * *

Hermione was first aware of the smell and texture of buttery soft leather. She blinked sandy eyes cautiously, and waited for more pain or nausea. Some of the tension ebbed out of her body when they did not come. Even as the ceiling came into focus from the sofa on which she lay prone, she recognized the layout of the house, differences in the decor and furniture notwithstanding.

 _He's found me. He's brought me inside, and healed me. Does he even know who I am?_

She turned her neck and saw him, standing in a stiff and vaguely dazed way, as if she had caught him frozen in the very moment between the blunt force trauma and the toppling over. His eyes were suspiciously wet and reddened; that fact, along with the wary and almost unwelcoming way Susan was looking at her, answered her own mental question.

"Who are you?" Harry's voice was rough, and in it, she could hear the echoes of her own accusing questions, when the other Harry had set off her wards in Godric's Hollow. His wand was in his hand, but was angled toward the shiny, hardwood floor, rather than at her. Still, she felt at a distinct disadvantage lying down, and strove to push herself upright, while trying to disguise how the room began to spin and sway around her. He made an involuntary movement toward her, instinctively desiring to offer aid, which he checked. She lifted her chin to meet his tortured gaze with her own.

"You know who I am."

"That's not possible."

She realized that they must have checked her for Polyjuice and other conventional methods used for impersonation, while she was unconscious. Her appearance could not be explained by any means they had, and so they were waiting to see if she could give an accounting of herself.

"That's what I thought at first too," she responded cryptically, a bitterly amused smirk twisting her lips. For the first time, she took full notice of the toddler cradled in Susan's arms, slumped over her shoulder, clearly asleep.

"Her – Hermione Granger has been dead for two years." What it took out of him to say those words was quite apparent in his face. A shadow flickered in Susan's eyes, and she shifted the child to her other side, brushing the rumpled brown curls away from her face.

"I'll just go put Jeannie back in her cot." She spoke to Harry only, emphatically ignoring the interloper in their lounge, as she glided toward the foot of the stairs, trying not to jostle the child.

"I was there, you see, when she – when she passed on, so I'm – I'm asking you to explain – to – " he trailed off into heavy silence. Hermione was not listening; she had instead tracked Susan's progress across the room and out of sight. The quiet footfalls faded up the staircase.

Something in the little girl's posture, in the cascade of tumbled hair…

" _Jean_ nie?" She arched an eyebrow at him, even while her heart pounded furiously against her breastbone. She thought she might have achieved nonchalance if she weren't the color of waxed parchment and struggling to sit upright.

Harry's face paled as though he had been hit with a singularly effective Bleaching Charm. She could see several emotions parade across his face in sequence: pain, grief, chagrin, wistfulness.

"She's hers, isn't she? Your Hermione's, I mean."

Harry's dark brows lowered stormily over his brilliant eyes. "What the hell does that even mean?"

She took a deep breath to begin explaining, but Jeannie's overtired sobs drifted down the stairs, along with Susan's sing-song voice of frustration.

"Har _ry_ , she wants _you_."

He moved toward the stairway immediately, though it was several heartbeats before he broke away from her gaze. He swiveled back toward her, with one foot on the lowest stair, gripping the finial in one tense hand.

"We're not done," he reminded her, and though his voice carried a definite tone of assertive authority, there was something so _Harry_ in his eyes that she felt the corners of her mouth uptilt in the slightest of smiles.

His heavier tread dwindled to the upper floor of the house, and she could hear Jeannie's discontent fade into silence. As she eyed the cheery stone fireplace opposite the sofa on which she said, she gingerly reached up to feel the knot at her temple. It was still tender, but no longer throbbing or raw, and seemed to have been reduced in size as well. _Deft work_ , she thought, _a Healer's work_ , and she wondered which of them had performed the spells. She let her gaze drift around the room, taking in the simple, tasteful decor and the pictures of Jeannie in various stages of development that were sprinkled around the room, and utterly missed the lighter steps descending until Susan was standing before her.

The other woman regarded her somewhat helplessly for a moment, as if she were trying to reconcile what she knew with what she saw before her. Hermione twisted her hands together tightly in her lap, as the silence drew out interminably.

"What _are_ you?" Susan finally asked, a pleading note leaking through. _Explain this away,_ she did not say. _Give me any kind of reason that would make you someone_ other _than Hermione Granger… please._

"My name is Hermione Granger. I finished Hogwarts in 1998. I was in Gryffindor House. Most likely, all the things you knew about Hermione when you met her in school are true about me." She began her narrative quietly, speaking in a manner meant to engender calm discourse. It took some effort on her part; she had grown used to being blunt-edged and confrontational for survival's sake.

"When I met _her_? As opposed to _you_?"

"I am Hermione Granger. But I am not the Hermione Granger that you knew." She breathed in and out, once, deeply, and plunged ahead. " When did Harry defeat Voldemort?"

"Our fourth year," Susan replied almost mechanically. "There was a tournament. Harry was kidnapped. There was a magical ritual that was supposed to use Harry's blood to give Voldemort a new body, but something went wrong… Why don't you know that?" Suspicion reappeared, fringing the edges of her voice.

"I fought in a Final Battle against Voldemort in 2001. Harry Potter was killed just seconds after he dealt Voldemort a death blow." Hermione had forced herself to speak placidly, but drew in a painful, shuddering breath that made her feelings apparent. "In the universe I'm from, the Order members, my schoolmates, everyone I loved is dead. Lucius Malfoy is the Minister, and I'm a wanted criminal."

"Your universe…" Susan echoed faintly. She had a distant stare, as though she were groping for the shreds of a dream or a lost idea. "Sweet Merlin – the Unspeakables…they have a room – it's so highly classified that not even my boss at the MLE knows much about it. But it's – it's something like that… I heard them talking about it. They said, 'There's more than one of everything.'"

"The Multiverse Room," Hermione nodded. "I've seen it – in my universe, that is. I met with another Harry, who was searching the universes for his Hermione, who was lost. I – I realized that I had nothing – nothing left in my universe to stay for, and so… so I decided to leave it – "

"To what end?" Harry's voice carried over to them, as he descended the final three stairs and reentered the room. Hermione flushed, and her gaze danced over Harry, then Susan, and then away from them both.

"To – to find – " Hermione stammered, but wasn't sure how to proceed.

"To find you," Susan finished flatly, directing her response to him. The color in her cheeks was heightened, and she pressed her lips together firmly, as if that would head off any rising emotion.

"Susan, I certainly don't – "

"I'm sure the two of you have a lot to talk about. I'm going to check on Jeannie." She carried herself almost regally, something in her last sentence holding a subtle reminder of her place in this house, in this family. Even so, there was a faint shadow in her eyes as she darted one last look at Hermione. _You could take him from me…if you so chose. Please don't take him from me._

A heavy silence draped over the room, broken only by the crackle-click of the flames in the grate. Harry glanced at her, and jerked his head in the direction of the kitchen. She trailed behind him, and watched from the doorway, as he began to clear the table and set the dishes to washing.

"What happened to her?" Hermione's voice was barely audible over the rattle of plates and the rush of running water.

"There've been isolated skirmishes between Aurors and Death Eaters ever since Voldemort was killed. There were usually no casualties, and it was more of a nuisance involving destruction of property than anything else." Harry was staying carefully clinical, choosing his phrasing with great deliberation. "During one of them, my – my wife took a curse to the back. She fell, struck her head… caused a severe subdural hematoma. The increase in intracranial pressure caused irreversible brain damage." He heaved a deep breath, keeping his back to her as he stood at the sink. "She was three weeks pregnant – we weren't trying; she didn't know – she wouldn't have been ordered to the firefight otherwise. We – _I_ kept her on LSP until she – until she had Jeannie. She never regained consciousness or any kind of independent brain function."

 _LSP –_ Hermione dredged the acronym from somewhere in the depths of her prodigious memory, _life-sustaining potions._

"You're a Healer?" She cocked her head to one side contemplatively, trying to imagine a world where Harry was the Healer and she the Auror.

"Not good enough of one." His bitterness was palpable, with the weariness of chronic regret. "I was still finishing my training. The Healers wouldn't have let me work on my wife in any case. Still I wonder what should've have been done differently – if anything would have made a difference. Should I have recognized the signs that she was expecting? Wouldn't that have kept her from being on the raid at all? Was I selfish to keep her alive – just to be able to keep a piece of her with me?"

Hermione approached him tentatively, the compassionate nature that she thought long ago suffocated and trampled out of existence rising back to the forefront. She tried to imagine herself killed in the line of duty, and then Harry living with the realization that his training, his _job_ hadn't been able to save her. To discover the pregnancy on top of everything else was most likely another level of pain altogether.

"I am sure that – that she would have wanted her baby – _your_ baby – to live, no matter what it took. And now you have Jeannie – you have an expression, an embodiment of your love for her. In my universe, Harry and I weren't – we had just begun to realize that we had feelings for each other. And then the Final Battle came. Voldemort killed Harry, even as he was dying at Harry's hand. For one perfect moment, we thought it was over and we had all the time in the world. And then he was taken from me… I was sure it was forever. But with the Multiverse Room, I thought – I thought there would be someone – another Harry somewhere – who had lost me, who needed me like I needed him." She lifted dark lashes to gaze at him with wet eyes. She took his hand, and felt it tremble in her grasp. "This would appear to be a tailor-made situation, almost exactly what I was hoping for."

"Almost?"

"If not for Susan. She loves you very much. I can see it on her face. How long have you been married?"

"Four months." Harry sighed and gently disengaged his hand. "I love her too. She was there at a time when I was barely functioning. She helped me when I was a grieving new father who had no idea what he was doing. And she did it all selflessly – knowing that there was a possibility that I might never feel the same way about her." An ethereal smile drifted across his face. "And then one day, I discovered that I did. But seeing you again – "

"I'm not her," she quietly reminded him. "Maybe I was like her… once. But I – I've lived as an outlaw, I've committed terrorist acts, I've killed people. I look back at the girl who finished Hogwarts at the top of her class, and I don't even recognize her anymore."

"I can still see her. She's there – in the deepest part of your eyes." His eyebrows crinkled, as he quirked the half-smile that had always made her heart melt. "Don't give up on her." Before Hermione could truly process what she was doing, she had flung herself into Harry's startled arms, squeezing him for all he was worth. The last day she'd seen him alive was so vividly seared into her memory, along with those fledgling feelings, that she had forgotten this Harry, the Harry she had first loved, the one who had come after her to warn her about a troll, her best friend.

Harry's arms flailed for purchase briefly, but then relaxed and encircled her. Hermione felt as if all of her perception was dialed up to eleven: the wiry-strong way his arms held her, the familiar, outdoorsy smell of him – albeit with a new undertone of medicinal potions, the feel of his hair against her cheek.

"I've missed him _so_ much," she breathed softly, and felt his arms tighten in a wordless response. After a moment, he extricated himself from her embrace, and held her by her upper arms, looking into her eyes with a recognizable green intensity.

"What can we do to help you?"

It was such a comforting question, so direct, cutting to the chase, that Hermione felt the burning tears tickle her nose anew. How long had it been since she had been offered assistance – not to further an agenda or cause, or to facilitate revenge, but simply because she had needed it? She coughed out a semi-hysterical laugh as she realized that it was probably _Harry_ that had done it – the one searching for his Lost Hermione.

Her eyes flicked over Harry's shoulder, instinctively following Susan's movement into the room. Hermione felt the blush paint her cheeks with heat, and she opened her mouth to … she wasn't sure… point out the platonic nature of the hug?

"It's all right, Hermione," Susan said carefully. There was something new in her eyes, a warming – pity, perhaps? Or was she seeing the flashes of her stepdaughter in Hermione's face? The latter couldn't be sure. Disdain wanted to rise within her; contempt she was used to – pity was somewhat harder to stomach. With an absent-mindedness born of familiarity and comfort, Harry scooped his wife around her waist, and pulled her to his side. Hermione couldn't stop a pang of envy as Susan leaned her head into the crook of Harry's shoulder, not necessarily for the man himself ( _maybe a bit_ , she admitted inwardly), but for the familiarity of the closeness. "I know it's been a long time…since you've seen him."

Hermione stammered an inarticulate thank you, and squared her shoulders, struggling to don a more businesslike exterior. She picked up her tale with the loss of Ron and Ginny, the slow, subtle oppression by the Ministry, the death of Draco Malfoy at her hand, Harry's appearance, Luna's murder (Harry and Susan exchanged aghast looks)… and finally, the day where Lucius Malfoy came after her – Undesirable Number One.

"He – he told me – the other Harry – " she clarified hastily, her voice only semisolid from unshed tears. "He had told me to get out of there, to go anywhere else – and I just couldn't face abandoning _my_ Harry, giving the victory to everything he died fighting against. I took too long – I almost didn't make it out – and now I guess – I'm … adrift in the multiverse. I can't go back, but I'm not sure I can stay either."

At Harry's quizzical look, she gave a brief rundown of the Constant, and what it meant in one's magical signature, how her attempts to alter hers had failed, quite painfully.

"You know, I – I lunch with Luna a couple of times a month," Harry ventured. "She's an Unspeakable, on the very cutting edge of healing research… pretty good with Runes too. We've bounced ideas off each other more times than I can count. Maybe she could help you. Susan might be able to get you down there – Merlin knows, I don't have any clearance."

Susan rolled her eyes good-naturedly, which Hermione took to mean: _Oh please, like anyone at the Ministry wouldn't roll out the red carpet for you, no matter which restricted area you wanted to see._

"Wouldn't the fact that I'm dead here cause some problems?" Hermione spoke the significant word rather gingerly, not wanting to trample over Harry's feelings.

"For the Department of Mysteries?" Susan's tone was incredulous. "This is only 'mildly outlandish' on their scale."

"It might be a good idea not to broadcast your presence to the … regular… Ministry employees," Harry interposed casually. "Not everyone is as open-minded as Luna is. We can go first thing in the morning – I've got second shift in Spell Damage tomorrow."

Hermione suddenly felt as though fatigue had snuck up behind her and quietly leached away every last scrap of energy. She realized that she'd had no idea what time it was, and she vaguely wondered when she'd last slept. There was a strange energy in the room, between the three of them. It was as if the shock of her presence had worn off, and the implications and possibilities were making themselves ever more apparent. Harry was looking anywhere but at her.

"We've… there's a guest bedroom." Susan gestured absently toward where the stairs spilled into the living area. "If – if you'd like to…" Her cadence was odd, and Hermione couldn't help but take note of the way Susan's attitude toward her had been fluctuating throughout the evening. _She was trying_ , Hermione realized, but this situation was probably beyond difficult: knowing that your husband's first wife, tragically lost, was his soul mate; taking care of a little girl that, while you loved her dearly, looked just like said first wife; finding an alternate version of that wife on your doorstep, _looking_ for your husband. The truth was clear: Susan was trying to be polite, but Susan did not feel comfortable having her sleeping upstairs in the guest bedroom.

"I'll just kip down here," Hermione offered. "It's not that much longer until morning anyway, right? Oh!" She jumped as remembrance hit her. "I – I had a bag…"

"It's just there." Harry pointed toward the far end of the sofa, where Hermione could see a loop of the black canvas strap peeking out.

"Thanks," she murmured, almost swallowing the word. Flames crackled in the grate, and the silence grew awkward.

"The loo is just through there," Susan pointed toward a door just down a stubby corridor. Hermione refrained from indicating that she already knew where every room in the house was, and just nodded in response. "Good night, Hermione."

She stood at the bottom of the stairs, waiting for Harry to finish twiddling with the bronze sconce at the end of the fireplace mantel, disconnecting the Floo for the night.

"You're not on call?" Susan asked.

"Not until Friday. Good night, Hermione." Harry managed a smile, but actually spoke his words to the picture frame on the wall just beyond her right shoulder. The couple drifted up the stairs together, and just before they had disappeared from her view – in fact, Harry probably already thought they were out of her sight – she saw Harry press a tender kiss to the tips of his wife's fingers.

The longing threatened to rise up and crush her. She let out a wobbly sigh that seemed to rebound off of all the shadowy corners, as she propped a square cushion against one end of the sofa, and pulled down the throw that lay across the back. She kicked off her shoes, and pulled the blanket up to her chin, pointing her wand at the fire to lower it. Her eyelids had already begun sliding closed, when she was startled by a figure standing at the other end of the sofa.

"I brought you a better pillow," Harry said, almost apologetically, proffering a larger pillow made for a bed.

"Thank you, Harry," she replied automatically, taking note of the way his eyes glowed in the low firelight, the way the banked coals shot streaks of dark copper into his hair. He was holding himself rigidly, almost as if some outside party were exerting _Imperius_ over him, like he'd rather be anywhere else, and yet he did not leave.

"Harry?" she queried in confusion, at the same time that he blurted,

"I'm so sorry, Hermione."

"Whatever for?" She managed to lace her tone with light bewilderment.

And then she knew. He missed her. He _wanted_ her. And he could sense – or perhaps see written all over her face – how much she yearned for him. But there were bridges that had been traversed and then burned; there were doors that had been shut and locked. He was married. _He was married_. And in that moment, Hermione knew that they could not – that even if they had been presented with the perfect opportunity, they _would not_ – act upon it. _"…loved I not honor more,"_ she thought with wry admiration.

"I just wanted to look at you – " he spoke clumsily, almost stammering. "To remember _her_. Again." He scrunched his shoulders up awkwardly, suddenly seeming much younger. "I'm sorry if that makes me a bit creepy."

She laughed a little, but grew sober quickly.

"No, I understand. Believe me, I do."

"Jeannie's so much like you. There's not much of me in her at all. It's – it's wonderful and horrible all at the same time…"

"You're a good father, Harry."

He dipped his head in acknowledgment of her compliment, and his hair swept across his forehead in disarray.

"I just wish…" There were a thousand things that he could have spoken into the trailing silence. _I just wish you would stay. I wish you had appeared six months ago. I wish my Hermione was here. I wish you had never come. I wish I loved Susan as much as she deserved._ Hermione wondered which ending he would have chosen, had he completed the sentence.

"I know," she soothed. "Harry, tomorrow I'll be gone. _She_ wouldn't have wanted to see you this way. And – and Susan doesn't deserve it. You were starting to let go, weren't you? You were starting to love her – and then I had to muck it all up by coming here." Harry opened his mouth to defend her from herself, but she rushed onward. "Don't push her away, Harry. Don't let this ruin what you were building together. Promise me." He tried to protest again, but she forestalled him, spearing him with her own dark, firelit gaze. " _Promise me_."

There was a helpless look in his eyes, as he acquiesced to her request.

"I promise."

"Thank you. Harry – ?" She spoke quickly, as he was turning away from her, then waited for him to complete his revolution and face her again. "Why didn't – why didn't the wards alert you when I came onto the property?"

A ghost of a smile flitted across his face, something feather-light caught in a spring zephyr.

"Because you're Hermione Granger," he said simply. "Good night." He swiveled up the stairs, using the finial as a pivot, in what must have been a habitual movement for him. She drank him in one last time, arranged the new pillow behind her head, and made herself close her eyes.

 _I am Hermione Granger_.

She fell asleep with a smile on her face.


	11. Chapter 11

_**Shadow Walker**_

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **-Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

 _ **Feels like I travel, but I never arrive. I want to thrive, not just survive.**_

 _ **-Switchfoot, "Thrive"**_

* * *

 **Chapter Eleven:**

Hermione was awakened by the curious sensation of something apparently walking across her face. She remained quite still, allowing her senses to provide feedback to her now conscious mind. There was the clatter and rustle of meal preparation in the kitchen, accompanied by the murmur of low voices from a Wireless. Low light filtered through the windows and glowed beyond her eyelids at an early morning angle. She could smell bacon. And her feet were cold.

"Jeannie!" came Harry's voice, an equal mixture of amused and chastising. Hermione's eyes shot open at the responding stream of toddler babble issued right next to her head. "You're disturbing Miss Granger." The little girl's adorably round face, so close as to be almost out of focus, immediately became contrite, and the exploring fingers straightened and gentled to softly pat her cheek in apology. There was another incomprehensible parade of syllables, culminating in a repeated _goo-nite, goo-nite_ , evidently an invitation to return to sleep.

"Well, it's too late for that, Miss Jean," Harry responded, light and loving, appearing to understand every scrap of gibberish his daughter said. "You've already awakened her now, so why don't we invite her to breakfast?"

The little patting hand drummed a rhythm on her cheek, and Hermione struggled with the myriad of feelings that unfurled because of those baby fingers.

"Bik-fus?" Jeannie asked. "Bik-fus?" She pointed a finger toward the kitchen, and looked back at Hermione with a questioning smile. The expression on the little girl's face suddenly looked so much like the framed pictures that had once been in her parents' home – minus the dated clothing and the somewhat prominent teeth – that Hermione felt wetness on her cheeks before she even realized that she was crying. When Jeannie's little eyes grew somber with empathy, and her lower lip started to protrude, Hermione sat up decisively, dashing away the stubborn, sneaky tears.

"I'm okay, Jeannie. It's all right. I would _love_ to have breakfast with you."

Harry stood at the hob, managing a skillet full of eggs with one hand and directing bacon onto a plate with his wand, shirt tail out and hair still damp from his shower. His too-casual stance meant that he was pretending to ignore the exchange between herself and Jeannie, but was actually all too aware of it.

"Have a seat," he nodded toward the table brusquely, as he dished up the food, and sent toast arcing over from the toaster to the rack. She chose a chair that was not one of the ones Susan and Harry had been using the night before, and watched with bemusement as Jeannie chose the most difficult way to sit down, climbing up and over the arm of her wooden high chair, before sitting in it and reaching for the tray, which rested behind the chair on two hinged arms.

Hermione assisted by lifting the tray up and over, until it was within reach of the toddler's dimpled arms, a move that brought a remonstrating and indignant,

"I do it," from the little girl, as she settled the tray into place. Harry sighed.

"She's getting very independent. Doesn't ever want anyone to help her – "

" – even if that means it takes three times as long," Susan finished for her husband upon entering the kitchen, pressed Ministry robes unfurling behind her. She was still fastening the catch on one of her hoop earrings.

"Good morning, love," Harry smiled and bussed her lightly on the mouth. "Have time for breakfast?" Susan shook her head apologetically, even as he pressed toast into her hand.

"I have a meeting first thing. But I should be done by nine. So if you bring her by then, I'll available to help out… if there are any problems." Harry's eyes flitted from Hermione to Susan, and he nodded, handing a plastic plate of eggs and toast to Jeannie, while Susan tucked a stray tendril back into her upswept hair.

"Bye, Jeannie-bean," she sang, leaning down for a hug, utterly unmindful of the messy hands that dribbled crumbs on her robes. She nuzzled into the little girl's neck, until Jeannie giggled, pushing her away with a laughingly reproving,

"Mum- _ma_!"

The three adults in the room all seemed to freeze for a moment, with Susan pausing infinitesimally, and then faking cheeriness for Jeannie's sake. Harry's hands stilled on the spatula, and was so determinedly _not_ looking at either one of them that he might as well have been staring. Hermione knotted her fingers into her lap, wondering if one could take oneself to another universe merely by _wishing_.

"I will see you later on, angel," she said to the toddler. "We'll see you at the Ministry, yeah?" Her eyes were almost apologetic, as the question included both Harry and Hermione. The latter nodded absently, wondering how it could feel so much like an elbow to the solar plexus for a little girl that wasn't _really_ hers to begin with to call someone else 'mother'.

Harry twined his hand with Susan's, and walked her around the corner to the fireplace. Hermione heard a murmured exchange, another kiss, and then the familiar rush of flames. She caught a glimpse of Jeannie, studiously using her fingers to situate bites of egg on her fork prior to actually using the utensil, before lowering her gaze to the placemat in front of her, which blurred with her dazed and fatigued tears. She didn't even notice Harry reenter the room, until he set a plate in front of her and joined her at the table, which caused her to jolt visibly.

"You're too thin. You really should eat something." Harry remarked blandly, pulling the marmalade toward him and spooning some onto his bread. Hermione felt herself flush as she caught sight of the bony wrists that hung out of her fraying, much _Reparo_ ed sleeves.

"Food's not always been easy to come by."

"How's your head feeling this morning?"

"It's fine."

"Any nausea?"

"Damn it, Harry! Don't you dare try to Heal me!" Tears clogged her voice, and she wasn't even sure that she understood why: only that she felt like she _knew_ him, and he was treating her like some random patient, and their little girl was sitting in a high chair eating breakfast, and she was going to have to leave… Her outburst was unjust, and he would have been within his rights to say so, but he was just looking so sorrowfully at her that it made her heart constrict.

 _I am Hermione Granger_.

She thought of those words, the ones he had given her, the last thing she had thought before falling asleep. She clung to them, to that knowledge, that one thing that lasted when everything else – _Harry, Ron, Ginny, Mum, Dad, Luna_ – even her very universe, had been ripped away.

She jerked her chin up, her gaze violently colliding with his, as he reached out and took her hand. He seemed to read her as easily as he – or any version of him – always had.

"She was always one of the strongest people I'd ever known," he said softly. "I stand by what I said last night. I think you're more like her than you know. I'm going to do whatever it takes to help you however I can." She managed to force an audible expression of thanks through her clogged throat, as he squeezed her hand, his thumb skidding across her knuckles, and finished eating his breakfast.

"I'm going to take Jeannie over to the Burrow. Molly usually watches her during my shifts, if Susan's at work. You're welcome to use the shower upstairs. I'll be back in a bit, and we'll head over and see Luna." The last part of his speech was almost a question; he looked inquiringly at her, as he wiped off Jeannie's face and hands. "Would you – would you want to see Ron? He and Charlotte – his wife – have a little house in Ottery St. Catchpole."

The image of Ron, breaking through the Auror lines, in a steep dive that was a long shot effort to save his sister, flashed through her mind like it had occurred yesterday. She remembered the warmth of his hand atop hers, as she saw in his eyes feelings to which he would never give voice. She wondered for the thousandth time what had happened to him.

"No," she replied apologetically, shaking her head in a jerky, uneven way. "This – this is hard enough. He doesn't need to know. And you – I don't want to hurt you anymore, if I can possibly help it. I'm – I'm incredibly sorry for all this."

"Don't be," he almost whispered. "I miss her every day, like there is part of me that is permanently gone. I didn't get to tell her good-bye… at least, not where she was aware of it. And we never got to share in the joy that is Jeannie. Getting to see you see her, and talk to her – that's a gift, Hermione." He spoke her name carefully, reverently.

"I didn't get to say good-bye either… not until the – the other Harry came, looking for _his_ Hermione."

"Did it help?"

"Yeah…" she said, tentatively at first, and then with more certainty. "Yeah, it did. And I certainly never would have even known to try _this_ , if he hadn't come. I wonder if he ever found her."

"My falling hopelessly in love with you seems to be a recurring theme across universes," he remarked with a melancholy smile, humor briefly brightening his olivine eyes. "Surely not all of them end tragically." Her voice echoed his faintly, as a faint furrow appeared between her brows.

"Surely not…"

The generous folds of the nondescript gray cloak that swathed her head and body also muffled her hearing and cut off her peripheral vision. She kept her chin angled down, and tried to keep Harry in her line of sight, while walking several strides behind him. It was not easy, as he was stopped equally as often by people who knew him and by those who knew _of_ him and just wanted to shake his hand. He was dressed unassumingly in Muggle street clothes, with his Healer's robes tucked into a leather messenger bag slung across his shoulders. Even so, he attracted attention without even trying. The fifth time he was greeted and she changed her trajectory so that she had stopped her progress without really stopping her motion, she wondered if perhaps Ministry security would detain her, thinking she was stalking the Boy Who Lived.

It wasn't until they arrived at the Department of Mysteries that she understood the two-fold purpose of her cloak. The Unspeakables wore a grey robe and hood not unlike the one she had donned. It appeared they remained hooded any time they left their department. As they approached the door that she still sometimes saw in dreams, she saw Susan waiting for them, a long slender bag in her hands.

"You made it." There was more than slight relief in the other woman's voice. She held out the DMLE Shield-Charmed Evidence Pouch that contained Hermione's wand, safely getting it past the checkpoint at the entry, and Hermione took it gratefully.

Together, the three of them stepped through the nondescript doorway at the corridor's end, and Susan had barked out, "Reception," almost before the Entrance Chamber had begun to spin. The door that flung itself open in response led them into a very innocuous looking waiting room, complete with ugly floral-upholstered furniture, where Susan showed her wand and her MLE badge, and asked for Luna Lovegood.

A moment later, the elfin blonde appeared from the Entrance Chamber, the gray cloak giving her an even stronger appearance of gliding.

"Susan! And Harry! Whatever are you doing here? Did the wrackspurt infestation expand beyond level Eight? I don't see how – the interns painted everything yellow."

"We need to consult with you about something." Almost imperceptibly, Susan's eyes flickered over to Hermione's shadow-shrouded form. Luna noticed the glance, but gave only the barest of outward signs.

"Of course. My office is this way on Tuesdays." The former Ravenclaw led them to a nondescript door just beyond the reception desk, gestured them into a neglected-looking corridor, and clapped her hands three times. A door materialized in the wall, _L. Lovegood_ , engraved in a brass plaque to one side.

"Looks like the wrackspurts left something on your hand," Harry pointed out cheekily, his eyes drawn to the spot when she clapped.

"Don't be silly, Harry. Wrackspurt droppings are usually lilac in color. Rolf gave this to me." She colored faintly as she looked at the quirkily fashioned diamond in a setting of what looked like metallic vines, on the fourth finger of her left hand. "He promised me a Snorkack expedition if I would marry him… so I said yes."

"Seems like a fair exchange," Harry said seriously.

"He put his foot down at taking my name though."

"Well, what's wrong with Scamander? 'Snot such a bad handle."

"You wouldn't say that if it were _your_ last name. Harry Scamander?" The ease of their conversation struck Hermione as both unusual and enviable.

"You're right," her best friend mused. "Sounds like some sort of awful sexually transmitted disease."

Susan snorted, and muttered a mildly reproving, "Harry!" As Luna opened her door and ushered them in, Hermione tugged on Harry's sleeve surreptitiously.

"You speak Luna quite well."

"It took years of study," he affirmed softly, though it seemed harder for him to pull off a light-hearted tone with her than with Luna, to whom he heartily directed what he said next. "Well, congratulations to my favorite Eagle." His fondness was evident in his voice.

"And give our regards to Rolf," Susan added, moving to hug the smaller woman. Luna returned the gesture, and made as if to hug Harry as well, but she stopped short and coughed, waving her hand in front of her face as if to clear the air. "Your aura wants shampooing, Harry. I know you don't cleanse it as often as you should."

"I've had some things come up."

"I suppose those things have to do with the shade of Hermione that you brought with you?" The other three occupants of her office looked at each other with baffled surprise. Hermione pulled her hood back with one thin hand.

"I'm not a shade, Luna." The Unspeakable regarded Hermione carefully, as if taking her measure.

"Well, then that makes you a bigamist, Harry Potter. Unless you've just figured out how to solidify the ethereal, in which case I think Burney Oglethorpe is going to want to talk to you. He hasn't been able to do it in the seventeen years he's been down here."

"I'm Hermione Granger, but I'm from another universe. And it's _really_ good to see you again, Luna." She tried not to think of the gruesome last image she had of her friend, wanting to imprint instead the one she saw before her today: a serene, contented Luna, happily engaged.

"So, I'm dead in your universe then?" She seemed to assume its truth with amazing equanimity, while Hermione was busy being shocked at her perceptiveness. "I do hope you didn't have to witness it. That kind of shock makes one susceptible to colonies of Insidious Reaverfangs, you know."

"Could you get us into the room? I mean, do you have access?"

"Yes, I can get you in. Not that you couldn't get Stubby Boardman to let you in, if I couldn't." She first inclined her head at Harry as she spoke, and then she shook it, a few strands of her hair that had escaped her clip swishing behind her like wind-blown wheat. "I still don't understand how a rock star gets elected Minister."

"It'd be easier if we involved as few people as possible," Harry answered for Hermione, who was trying not to look as flummoxed as she felt, on hearing of "Stubby Boardman's" position in the Wizarding Government. "Considering how quiet your department enjoys keeping things, I would think that having to explain to the Wizarding public how Hermione is suddenly back with us would be … potentially problematic."

"Not to mention the bigamy," Luna added matter-of-factly.

"That too." Harry shifted uncomfortably in his chair.

"So, Hermione, what is it you are trying to accomplish here?"

"Life in my universe has become… untenable for me. Everyone I know is dead. Harry killed Voldemort, but his followers still managed to come into power. I – I tried… but it wasn't enough… _I_ wasn't enough. I'm trying to find a new home. In a world where… someone's… circumstances might be different." She felt the heat climb from her neck into her face, and she kept her gaze on the scrolled edge of Luna's desk.

"You have a crystal, don't you?" At Hermione's nod, Luna continued. "Then you don't really need me – or the Multiverse Room – at all. You would be at the mercy of the multiversal tide, but you would be able to move through universes without hindrance. You could stay in a universe indefinitely, if your crystal is deactivated, but not removed. Unless you're completing a thesis on the mating habits of Heliopaths, I'm not sure how much help I could be."

"It's not good enough – having to depend on a necklace is not good enough! I've had _everything_ taken from me. When I find the universe that needs me, I want to stay there, make it permanent."

"There is no known way to – "

"I want to change my Constant," Hermione blurted, before Luna could finish. There was a long pause, a rather startled blink of Luna's strikingly light eyes the only outward sign of a response.

"That isn't possible."

"I never would have thought I'd hear _that_ come out of your mouth," Hermione snorted bitterly.

"You could be right. Shall I rephrase? It's highly unlikely and has never been successfully accomplished… in this universe, anyway." Harry and Susan exchanged somewhat befuddled glances, completely at sea.

"So it's been attempted?" Hermione had a sly expression, as she tried to pin Luna down within the constraints of her wording.

"There was a series of experiments…" Luna drew out slowly. Her hand trembled slightly on her desktop; she was having difficulty getting words out, and her brow crinkled up with strain. "I – " Harry was out of his seat in the next moment, checking her pulse and her pupils, and casting a subtle Diagnostic spell on her with his wand, even as she tried to wave him away. "It's nothing, Harry… just – "

"The enchantments are working, aren't they?" he asked grimly. "You're not supposed to be talking about this."

"One of the hazards of being an Unspeakable. Although it's not quite as bad as drawing a shift with the Sanguinary _Lepidopterae_." She took a deep breath, in an effort to recover herself, and then said, "It's usually quite painful… can be torturous even. There is a more than even chance that one's magic can be lost entirely." At first, Hermione thought Luna was referring to the consequences of Unspeakables broaching confidential topics, but then she realized that the vagueness was intentional, a way to circumvent the restrictions. "Nothing has ever gone beyond creature testing. It was deemed too dangerous."

"Creature testing?" Hermione wanted to work up some righteous indignation about that, but her idealism was much faded in the face of the struggle for survival.

"Mostly knarls or murtlaps. It had to be a creature with a magical signature, or it – " Luna stopped again, and drew air in through her teeth to suppress pain. "The signature of a magical beast – the ones we experiment with, at least – is much weaker than the signature of a magical being. The results aren't conclusive, but – the animals were in so much pain that it only stands to reason that – "

" – it would be worse for witches or wizards," Hermione finished dully.

"It wasn't ever done successfully." Luna rushed the words out, and then closed her eyes as she took a deep, steadying breath. Harry was watching her with prodigious concern.

"Perhaps that's because it's only ever been tried on creatures indigenous to _this_ universe…rather than something or someone transient."

"Conjecture."

"When has that ever stopped you?"

The ghost of a smile danced across Luna's face. "Touche."

Hermione pulled out the book and the notes that she and the other Harry had acquired on their covert operation into the Ministry. "I have some information from my universe. There could be something new in there. I tried to alter mine myself, but I couldn't do it. Maybe it was because I remained in my home universe… or maybe I had the magical theory wrong… or – "

"Wait a minute," Harry interrupted, leaning forward, one elbow propped on the narrow arm of his chair. "You already tried it? I've seen cases of magical accidents that temporarily nullified one of the lesser runes – it makes your magic go all wonky. I don't think you'd be able to remove a Constant, unless you had another rune ready to replace it – that is, if it could be done at all. It would have to be a – a transplant, really – an almost instantaneous swap."

Hermione felt her blood run like ice through her veins, and she shivered. Had she been so bent on her course of action that she could have made such a potentially lethal mistake?

"What – what do you think would happen, if you ripped out a Constant?" She asked. Luna was flipping through the leather-bound portfolio, having donned a pair of reading glasses that were blindingly green, lenses and all.

"There is no way to know for sure. But it could be almost anything – removal of the Constant could be the key to completely dismantling one's ability to perform magic. It could kill you. It could transform you into something else altogether."

There was a moment of dense silence in the little office. Harry was watching her with a measured look, a look that she definitely recognized, even in a different time, a different universe. There was some comfort in the things that _did_ remain the same.

"I want to know how you did it. I want to know everything I can know about the theory of transplanting a Constant. I won't try it until I find a place that I want to stay, but if I only get one chance, I want to be as informed as possible."

"That should be possible…" Luna allowed. "Before you go, may I make a record of your magical signature? We can catalog your Constant, and map your universe." Neither woman noticed Harry straighten in his chair, as though he'd just been hit with unexpected inspiration, although Susan shot him a wary glance.

"Be sure you put warning labels on it," Hermione muttered, not really joking, as she submitted to the spell. "Lucius Malfoy is Minister, and is intent on subjugating anyone who isn't a Pureblood."

"Naturally," Luna said absently, _Accio_ ing a bit of parchment from a sheaf on her bookshelf and making several notations with the quill that she pulled from from her updo. Hermione wondered if she knew that a segment of her pale hair had been stained with ink.

Less than fifteen minutes later, Luna was escorting them back through the waiting area, pressing Hermione's portfolio back into her hands. It had been duplicated back in Luna's office, and several sheets of parchment had also been added to the original. Hermione tucked it away carefully, pulling her hood back over her curls.

"Thank you for everything," she told the Unspeakable sincerely. Luna smiled equably in return, as she ushered them into the Entrance.

"What are multiversally alternate equivalents of previously deceased friends for?" A laugh, like a measure of silvery melody, escaped Hermione's lips unbidden. "The Chamber of the Veil," Luna added, addressing the spinning doors in an authoritative voice. Hermione opened her mouth to speak, but the Ravenclaw forestalled her. "This will give you an open enough area that is sufficiently private to change universes." A faintly nostalgic smile had drifted across Harry's face as Hermione had laughed, but at Luna's last words, it vanished as though it had been hexed off.

"Exit," Susan called out abruptly, causing her husband's brow to furrow in concerned query. "I've got to get back to work," she said, almost apologetically. "And I think _you_ need," she pressed his hand, "to say good-bye to Hermione without your anxious and slightly jealous wife hovering over your shoulder." She laughed a bit at herself, but her eyes were soft with genuine emotion and soon mirrored in Harry's.

"Merlin's beard, I love you," he whispered, as he pressed a kiss into her hair. "I'll head straight to work after this, so I'll see you at home tonight, yeah?" Susan gave his hand a parting squeeze, as she nodded, and then strode out of the second door that had opened, into the black-tiled Ministry corridor.

Luna led them into the vast empty room, the only features the stone stadia seating and the archway, its curtain undulating slightly with unfelt wind. Hermione's thoughts grew troubled as she remembered this place: remembered the purple flare that was one of the last things she'd seen, remembered the feeling of her blood roaring in her ears as they'd dueled Death Eaters, dueled Lucius Malfoy… Harry was gawping at every corner of the vast room in amazement. Luna was evidently trying to give them some privacy; she had moved over to the arch, and was taking a reading with her wand.

"Is that _the_ Veil?" he said, with undisguised incredulity. "I thought it might be one of those outlandish stories you hear. Luna's fancies are fairly tame compared to some of the rumors you hear about this place – I never thought – " he broke off suddenly at the shadowed look in Hermione's eyes, and grew somber. "You've been here before."

"Yes. Harry led us here. He'd been… misinformed about something. It was a trap; there was a battle. I was hit by a purple flame curse… nearly died. And Harry lost – "

"Lost what?" But Hermione shook her head, forcing herself out of her reverie. _Stubby Boardman is the Minister for Magic._

"It doesn't matter now. Thank you for everything you've done. I hope I – I haven't made things too awful for you." She pressed her lips together tightly, willing herself not to cry.

"How could you make things awful, when you light up everything you touch? You always have." She wanted to point out the absurdity in thinking that anyone as gloomy and damaged as she was could light up _anything_. But he took her hands in his, turned them palms up, and lifted them to his lips. She closed her eyes to weather the force of the emotion that buffeted her, and when she looked down, she saw that he'd closed his eyes too. Slowly, he pulled on her trapped hands and drew her into an embrace. "I'm glad I got to meet _you_ ," he whispered with careful emphasis into her ear.

"Take care of Jeannie… for – for both of _us_. And love Susan." She swallowed the clog of tears in her throat, and slowly backed away from him, holding onto his hands for as long as she could. He nodded, not trusting himself to speak. When his arms had fallen back to his sides, she withdrew the chain from under her cloak, and sighed a broken, barely audible, " _Adjicio Universum,_ " as she tapped the crystal with her wand.

She did not break her gaze from his, as the corners of her mouth tipped upward in the faintest of smiles. She started to move one arm, raising her hand in farewell…

…and then she was gone.

The curtain in the archway snapped suddenly, but as quickly as Harry looked up, had resumed its placid billowing. Luna was still in front of it, but was watching him with clear sympathy, and not a little respect.

"You are a good person, Harry Potter."

"So they tell me," he said sardonically, unable to keep his shoulders from slumping under the weight of the emotional turmoil and dredged-up grief.

"Do you have a date in mind for your trip?" she asked placidly. He could not keep his gaze from jerking up to meet hers, his surprised guilt clear in his blazing green eyes.

"How do you – " Instead of finishing his question, he sighed. "Why do I even ask?" She tilted her head to blink calmly at him, causing the feathered end of her quill to dangle haphazardly over one ear. She tapped one foot on the stone chamber floor, the very picture of patient waiting. "I'll go as soon as you have one of those crystals set to her universe. And as soon as you can explain to me the proper procedure…"

"To do what?" There was a gleam in her sky eyes that suggested that she already knew, but wanted to make him say it out loud.

"I want to relieve Minister Lucius Malfoy of his Constant. For _her_."

Luna smiled back at him, her demeanor decidedly neither vague nor outlandish.

"I'll Owl you first thing in the morning."


	12. Chapter 12

_**Shadow Walker**_

 _ **Your love is like a shadow on me all of the time.**_

 _ **-Bonnie Tyler, "Total Eclipse of the Heart"**_

* * *

 _ **For I am finding out that love will kill and save me.**_

 _ **-Trading Yesterday, "The Beauty and the Tragedy"**_

* * *

 **Chapter Twelve:**

Time bled in rushing torrents, blurred like smudged pencil, meandered, raced, marched, danced… Hermione Granger slid from one universe to the next the way a competitive diver knifes into the waiting water. Waiting… there was a lot of that too. She was in the midst of a lengthy stretch where she remained out of phase, thus becoming a spectator in the universe, a watcher unable to participate in any way, or effect any change. She strangled her impatience with desperate hands, and strove to bide her time, jotting any new bits of useful information into the cramped margins of Luna's tattered book.

In one universe, Harry was ensconced in a meteoric rise through the Ministry, while she taught at Hogwarts; they were seemingly content with thrice yearly get-togethers. In another, Harry had been sorted into Slytherin; the two of them had apparently had a stormy relationship across House lines that had ended badly, and they were still trying to get over it. In a third, _she_ had been sorted differently – into Ravenclaw. Harry had never known her as more than a passing acquaintance, and had defeated Voldemort in the Hall of Prophecies at age twenty, with the help of Ron, Neville, and Katie Bell. She was in some universes for only minutes, some for days. The passage of time, as counted by those affected by it, was somewhat harder to pin down, but Hermione was fairly certain that she had not stayed in any one universe longer than a week or so.

In her ninth consecutive out-of-phase universe – if one did not count the lone universe where she had been in phase for the longest thirteen seconds of her life, during what had to be an Ice Age – she soon found herself moving through the Forbidden Forest toward Hogwarts. She had noticed that Godric's Hollow and Hogwarts seemed to be focal points for Harry – places that he had virtually always had contact with or ended up in. The house in Godric's Hollow was a ruin, a skeletal corpse of what had once been a home, its battle scars still quite apparent. She did not linger in that haunted place, instead rematerializing just off school grounds.

As she neared the edge of the forest, she noted a group of people collected on the green, everyone's attention on a central cluster. She could see some of the last straggling leaves that clung to the gnarled branches finally surrender to the wind; she could hear its mournful whistle through the tree tops. But her hair remained unruffled, her skin untouched by the half-hearted light of the weak autumn sun, as she moved forward, unable to escape from her own alienness in this universe that was not her own.

At the spot where the trees gave grudging way to lush green lawn, she stopped, frozen in disbelief once she recognized the configuration of the people, the very aura of a solemn assembly, the _faces_ that made up those gathered. _Oh my God._

Professor McGonagall stood authoritatively, facing everyone else, her dress robes immaculate, her face somewhat more lined than the last time Hermione had seen her alive. She could see Ron, Ginny, all the Weasleys, Remus, Tonks, Luna… _her parents._ She felt her throat closing up, wondered if she could die suffocating on her own unshed tears. For, there, standing before their erstwhile Head of House stood Harry and … and herself.

The mirror version of her face was glowing, simply radiant with incandescent happiness, yet the shine in her eyes was due to more than just joy. She was gowned in an elegant set of ivory dress robes, and her hair was twisted up and crowned with flowers, though the wind had teased out a few wayward strands. And Harry – resplendent in dress robes so dark a shade of green that they were practically black – stood facing her, holding her hands in his, with a look of stunned and rapturous bewilderment on his face, as if he'd just been granted every wish he'd ever had… and could not quite bring himself to believe it. Her mum's hand was tucked into her father's elbow; they were both drinking in the scene as though they'd been through a long dry spell. Ron's grin threatened to split his face; he turned only to press a kiss to the top of Luna's blond head, where she was snuggled securely within his embrace.

"We are gathered here today as witnesses to the union of Harry James Potter and Hermione Jean Granger in marriage, in accordance with the laws of Wizarding Great Britain." The aging professor's face was stoic, but there was a quiver in her voice that she could not repress, and her eyes were rather softer than was their wont. "Any wedding is a special event, of course. This one would be more special than most, simply because of the nobility and the character of the two parties being wed. Beyond that, however, is the great love of the two people involved: a love that did not wither when most said that hope was gone, a love that may have despaired at times, but never surrendered, a love that persevered in the face of incredible odds, traversed across universes, and ultimately triumphed." There was a note of proud victory in McGonagall's voice. "And I believe I speak for all here, when I say that we are privileged and honored to be able to witness this moment, to see the years of grief be transformed this way, to see this very spot consecrated again, not by grief and pain and loss, but by hope and unity and joy."

There was a chorus of sniffles, including the party to be married, as well as one other that nobody heard. Hermione, the spectator, reached up to dash the wetness on her cheeks away with both hands, even as Harry moved to gently swipe tears from beneath the lovely eyes of his bride. There was such a look of ineffable peace on his face, the look of someone who'd been gifted a dream long deferred. _At last…_ his eyes seemed to say. And that was enough.

Hermione's heart had begun to pound slowly and painfully when McGonagall spoke of universes. That coupled with the look on Harry's face, the way that nobody present seemed to be able to stop weeping and smiling simultaneously, the way Hermione's parents looked at her… It all seemed to add up. Hermione did not doubt that this situation could have happened in many universes, perhaps with nearly undetectable differences – her own experience with the brown-eyed Harry had illustrated that much – but, though she could not have rationally explained it, somehow she was convinced – she _knew_ – that this was the Harry she had encountered in her sad little cell in Godric's Hollow, the Harry that had convinced her to attempt this quest, the Harry that had restored hope to her bitter and lonely heart.

And he had found her. He had come to the end of his quest. He had _won_.

Harry did not retake Hermione's left hand in his right, once he had dabbed at her tears. Instead he cupped her cheek with an open palm, and looked at her with so much naked emotion that the watching Hermione found it hard not to sob aloud

"I still can't believe I found you," was all he managed before he had to pause and collect himself. "The Headmistress makes it sound very noble and … and very Gryffindor, but – " He stopped again, and swallowed. "But there was really no choice at all. I love you. I love you _so much_ , and I never stopped, Hermione, not ever. Not even when all conventional wisdom told me the love was impossible. If there was even the smallest chance that I could find you, it would be worth it – it would be worth any price I had to pay." Hermione turned her head ever so slightly, planting the ghost of a kiss on the palm of his hand. "The multiverse has seen fit to return us to each other." Blinking, he collected himself to speak more formally, in a manner more consistent with wedding vows. "I do not take that lightly. You will have all of me, my heart, my soul, my love – for as long as I live. I do so swear."

Hermione took a deep, shuddering breath, and gently lowered his hand, so that they were joined once again by a double clasp.

"You came for me once – long ago, in a girls' bathroom." A ripple of light laughter drifted through the assembled. Harry's reminiscing smile was misty. "You've saved my life countless times between then and now. Even in the despair and fear that I felt when I watched Hogwarts burn in a foreign universe, I had no doubt that you would come for me again, that if there was a way, you would find it, and you would come for me. And you upheld my faith in you as you always have. I love you. I loved you when I was twelve years old, and I love you now. We have been separated long enough. I want to continue on the rest of our journey together. You have my whole heart, my unswerving devotion, and my steadfast love, for as long as I live. I do so swear."

Professor McGonagall called for the exchange of the rings. Hermione was too far away to see them properly, but she did see Remus gesture toward their hands as they slid the wedding bands into place, whispering something in Tonks' ear that she obviously found both interesting and touching.

"By the power bequeathed to me as the Headmistress of the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and under the authority of the Ministry of Wizarding Great Britain, I now pronounce you husband and wife." _My wife,_ Harry mouthed, his eyes sparkling like backlit emeralds. "You may kiss your bride, of course."

He took Hermione's face in both hands, the windblown tendrils of her hair tangling around his fingers, and they just lost themselves in each other's gaze for a long moment.

"I love you," he whispered.

"I know," she replied with a tremulous smile.

Then, and only then, did their lips come together, in a kiss that was just as much sweet sacrament as the solemn oaths of the preceding ceremony. Ron whistled shrilly, as some of his brothers cheered, and there was much laughter and many rounds of well-wishing.

Hermione watched it all, undetected and undetectable, one hand splayed at the base of her neck, a smile on her face and tears lacquering her cheeks. Part of her heart was rejoicing, remembering the bleak look of sadness, the hunger and longing, in Harry's eyes – _knowing_ how much he loved and missed Hermione, because she too had felt that raw and acid absence, the agony of loss. And now she was able to see him as he was meant to be, the anguish erased from his face, hopeful, happy, _whole._ The rest of her was occupied with a painful longing to experience what clearly radiated between the newlyweds.

The small group meandered casually up to the castle, Hermione and Harry hand in hand, but still chattering animatedly with those closest to them. The visiting Hermione drifted through the knots of people, as solitary as a drop of water wending its way down a pane of glass. She smiled at Ron and Luna's quietly rambling conversation, cast wistful eyes on her parents' lovingly exchanged glances, and felt her heart threaten to shatter completely with every beat.

School was surely in session, Hermione thought, but the Headmistress must have threatened her students with life and limb, for there had been no sign of anyone on the Hogwarts grounds. Her sharp eyes caught flips of cloaks around corners, heard hints of giggles and whispers carried on the castle drafts, but they were keeping their distance, as the wedding party and guests made their way up to McGonagall's office.

The room guarded by the gargoyle's watchful eyes was rather less cluttered than Hermione remembered it. She was pretty sure it could even be considered austere on any other day, but on this day, _this_ day, it was garlanded with swaths of pale silk and fragrant flowers, with Candlelight Charms flickering at intervals throughout. It was a look of understated elegance, and Hermione found herself thinking for one swooping moment, _It's exactly what I would choose, if I_ – before realizing that she, more or less, _had_ chosen it. _Right_ , she thought, rolling her eyes at herself.

Then, suddenly she froze, feeling absurdly like a student being caught out after hours by a Prefect. The noise of the party had risen to a dull roar, and Hermione felt sure that certain Charms were at work, because while the room was filled pretty close to capacity – one arc in the circle taken up by a crescent-shaped table on which rested a many-tiered cake and a prismatic punch bowl – it did not feel crowded. And in the midst of all the motion and noise… the shade of Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington was looking at her.

Not just 'in her direction', but _at_ her… she was sure of it.

He drifted in her direction, and the mixture of indignation and curiosity overpowered her instinct to flee. Unintentionally, her eyes sought out Harry, who was talking to Ron and Remus, and was flushed with laughter. _Ghosts can see those who are out of phase!_ Harry _had_ told her that – the memory screeched into her mind abruptly and without finesse. She couldn't help the flash of irritation at herself that surged up within her.

"What manner of sorcery is this?" Sir Nicholas asked her, talking to her out of the side of his mouth. "Are you Apparition? Phantasm? You are certainly like no ghost I've ever seen. Your likeness to the new Mrs. Potter is rather unsettling, to be sure. I would worry that you bore some nefarious plot against the Savior of the Wizarding World, but I doubt you're of any true danger, seeing that you appear to invisible to the _living_ in this room, and you just put your elbow through that Sneakoscope."

"I'm – I'm not from this universe. I am _a_ version of Hermione Granger from another reality. I – I certainly mean Harry no harm." She swiped her fingertips through a lapis lazuli globe depicting the positions of the stars in the night sky. "As you can see, I could do him no harm, even if I wanted to."

Sir Nick followed her gaze across the room. Harry's wife had rejoined him, bringing cups of punch, and he looped his other arm firmly around her waist.

"And why are you here then?"

"I know him. This – this Harry, I mean. I met him once. He – he changed my life. I saw the wedding outside. When I – when I realized that it was _him_ … I just wanted to see. I'm – I'm so glad that he found her."

"You're the one, then? The Miss Granger who helped him figure out a way to find _her_?" He cocked his head, rather grotesquely, in the direction of the newlyweds, his smile off-center above his ruff.

"He – he told you about that?" Hermione couldn't help the confusion that crept into her tone. Harry had never been one of those gregarious souls who volunteered a detailed story for a wide audience. But Sir Nick had the grace to look mildly ashamed of himself.

"Ah yes – well… He was telling her, Miss Lovegood, and Mr. Weasley about – well, about _you_ – in the Gryffindor Common Room after they got back. I… I was, er, listening." He leaned closer to her, reaching out to place a hand on her arm, a touch that would have been icy could she have felt it. "You have done a beautiful thing, Miss Granger. Make no mistake." The look in his eyes was almost proud. "I have not seen a smile like that on his face for a very long time."

Hermione looked toward Harry at Sir Nicholas's words, and realized with a start, and a cold chill down her spine, that he was looking in their direction. She tried to imagine what he would be seeing: Nearly Headless Nick conversing animatedly with … no one. She was subsequently quite surprised, when his eyes flickered unerringly on her position, and his eyes blazed with sudden knowledge and intensity. He leaned over to whisper something in the ear of his bride, disengaged himself, and began to walk toward them, dress robes billowing decisively in his wake.

"Sir Nicholas," he greeted the Gryffindor ghost in a cheery, off-hand way that fooled no one. His gaze was fixed on the empty space adjacent, and it was with difficulty that he tore his eyes away. "And who are we talking to?"

"I'd wager you know precisely with whom I converse." The shade's voice was overly formal, but his eyes were twinkling with amusement. "Or you would not have come over here."

Harry lit up, and Hermione's heart clenched with yearning, as though Sir Nick had reached through her breastbone and grasped it in his chilly hand.

"Hermione."

She beamed and nodded, uncaring that he could not see her. It was enough that he _knew_ she was there.

"How did – how did you know I was here?" She asked, and Nearly Headless Nick relayed the question. Harry told her how he had recovered his Hermione with another Sir Nicholas's aid.

"That – seeing Sir Nick see her, watching him talk to her, even though it looked like there was _nobody_ there. Well, it hasn't been all that long ago, but even if it had… I don't think it's something I'll ever forget. And I just – I looked over here, and it looked like that again. It could have just as easily been someone else, I suppose, but…" he shrugged, grinning sideways. "I just had a feeling. And you're not just any Hermione, are you? You're _her_ , the one who helped me break into the Department of Mysteries, who helped me charm the crystal with my Constant and bring her home."

"I – I did," she said, falteringly. Again, Sir Nicholas acted as the intermediary between them.

Harry pressed his lips together tightly, and for a moment, his eyes seem to search the high corners of the Headmistress's office.

"Thank you," he said, at length, looking at her with enough intensity as though he could actually see her. "I – I was trying to think of – of something eloquent to say, but – " he shrugged apologetically. "I couldn't have found her without you." His gaze tripped away again, seeking out and lingering over his radiant bride. "And – and you left," he noted, suddenly turning his attention back toward her. "I'm glad. I wasn't sure you would."

"I don't think I would have, maybe not ever, if it weren't for you. You – you showed me that such a thing was even possible. And I thank you for that."

"So, now you're a wanderer?" His eyes lit up above his crinkled smile, a smile of camaraderie. _He has been where I am_ , she thought suddenly. _Maybe that means one day I can be where he is._

"Just passing through…" she quipped, as she saw Harry beckon someone their way with a tilt of his head. She knew without turning that her alternate self was joining them, and she watched raptly as the shining happiness in Harry's eyes took on an almost incandescent glow.

"Hermione's here…" he murmured, his lips barely brushing the shell of his wife's ear. There was a momentary flash of confusion in her dark eyes, before she noted Sir Nick's proximity and put the pieces together.

"The one who helped you… brought you to me?" She didn't wait for Harry's affirmative response, but turned to the empty space with effusive gratitude. "Thank you . So much. Words are so inadequate. I can't ever – there's nothing that can repay – "

"It's Harry. How could I do otherwise?" Sir Nicholas spoke the noiseless words aloud.

"Still, it's meant the world to us both. You've given us… everything."

And a tiny flicker of _something_ kindled again in Hermione's heart, a drive, a _thirst_ , that had long been squelched by the heavy sense of failure, the loss of friends and family, and the hopelessness of her vengeful quest against her world. _Kicking against the goads_ … she thought of Ginny's words. Part of her was ashamed that it seemed so easy for her to lose sight of who she was, and part of her marveled that it was _this_ Harry – yet again – who continued to be instrumental in redirecting her attention to that.

For the first time, since she had left the lively cottage in Godric's Hollow where Harry and Susan Potter lived, she felt like she had a purpose and a presence, even here and out of phase. She _had_ helped them, when she thought she was long past being of any use to Harry or the Order or the Light.

"You're welcome." She responded with simplicity and as much sincerity as she could infuse into her voice. "I would do it again without a second thought." There was a beat of silence, and she allowed herself to study the happy couple one last time. _Merlin willing…_ she thought. "And now I really should be moving on."

Both of them erupted in protests, but Hermione would not be swayed. She really had no further desire to move around invisibly at her own wedding reception, with a ghost for a translator. And she had felt it, that trigger, like a switch within her that had flipped when she saw the fruits of her labors in the happiness of Harry and his bride - _she could do this_. She made sure to especially thank Sir Nicholas for all his help, and with a final unseen wave, more for her benefit than anyone else's, she moved through the heavy stone wall and thick tapestries until she was back on the castle grounds.

For reasons that she could not explain, even to herself, she went back to Godric's Hollow, ambling along the lane until she came to a stone bridge that crossed a rocky, burbling stream and led out of the village. She was careful not to actually stand on the bridge itself, but sat down cross-legged on the bank, and waited. She could always jump-start a shift herself, she supposed, but she worried about how much closer to her home universe that might take her.

She curled up on her side in the grass that was still damp from an earlier rain. It did not soak into her clothes, however, and neither did her skin react to the chill that sharpened as the sun disappeared behind the horizon. Knowing no one would see her, she took out her wand and Luna's book, and began to study, her agile mind trying to fill in those remaining holes in the multiverse theory. She wondered yet again how she was going to adjust her Constant to guard against being torn away from whatever universe she adopted as her own.

And then she felt it. The faintest hint of movement, a barely perceptible flicker on the periphery of her vision. A shift was imminent. She tucked her book and wand away safely, and inhaled a deep breath, steeling herself for the motion to come.

A shriek of panic suddenly ripped its way from her throat, as the ground gave way beneath her. The air whipped audibly past her ears as she plummeted, and then her breath was stolen away entirely, as she plunged into icy cold water. Her feet hit bottom and she ricocheted back toward the surface, but her upward movement was halted abruptly, as the edge of the portfolio strapped beneath her clothing snagged in a tangle of underwater branches. She protested, and a stream of bubbles blew upward in the swift current. Wand still in her pocket, her Bubblehead Charm was sub-par and leaky, but it bought her several precious seconds as she struggled to free her belongings.

She gave the bag one final violent jerk, and it tore loose, one strap completely disconnected, but now clutched tightly in her hands. She kicked her feet to propel herself up, just as her Bubblehead failed entirely and cold water rushed once again around her face. She had barely had time to break the surface and fill her lungs with precious oxygen, and no time at all to dash the river from her eyes, when something quite heavy landed right on top of her, shoving her back under the water. There was a wrenching pain at the junction of her neck and shoulder.

She flailed wildly, seemingly encumbered with entirely too many limbs, and surfaced again, spluttering and choking, barely catching the dangling broken strap of the leather-bound portfolio as it began to float away.

"What the _hell_?" She rasped, spitting out water, struggling to see, as a dark and clearly human figure floundered next to her. From the sounds of it, the person appeared nearly as half-drowned as she, and she managed to grasp the edge of his or her collar and pull them closer together. Her shoulder muscles protested, and she bit back a moan. "You nearly drowned me." She reached for her wand, as she treaded water, hoping against hope that it was still secured in her pocket, snorting a soggy sigh of relief when her numb fingers closed around it.

"I heard you scream. I was trying to save you." It was a man's voice, though blurred by water inhalation and coughing.

"Not that I don't appreciate it, but jumping into a river blind is not the wisest of ideas."

The antique-styled lamp at each end of the bridge seemed very far away, and Hermione marveled that in this universe, the charming little stream that tripped over river stones was a much larger body of water cut much deeper into the earth. Hoping that the proximity of the wizarding village meant that she would not have to Obliviate the person who had so unceremoniously landed on her head, she lit the tip of her wand with a whispered _Lumos._

"Sorry," the person was saying, a somewhat snide tone in his voice insinuating that he was not, in fact, sorry. "That's the only way I can jump into rivers."

She could not stop the gasp that flew through her parted lips, as a wet and shivering man was illuminated in the blue-white light of her uplifted wand. His dark hair lay lank on his forehead and was dripping into his eyes, which were grayish-white and clouded over. His gaze was just slightly off, directed somewhere over her shoulder, rather than at her. His name was a breathy whisper, escaping before she could stop it.

" _Harry…_ "

 **TBC – We are on the home stretch, folks. Just another chapter or two to go! Thanks so much to those who have faithfully stuck with this story. You may leave a review on your way out, if you like.**

 **-lorien829**


End file.
